


Don't get too close, it's dark inside

by SEABlRD



Category: Warcraft (2016), Warcraft - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Canon-Typical Violence, EDIT: chapter 2 is an art post :3c, Gen, I may have fudged the lore a bit but listen my dude lisntne n, M/M, Other, also dragons, because dragons are rad, because fuck you heartbreak, literally half of this is referenced directly from the novel, so like. sorry if it gets repetitive
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-02
Updated: 2016-10-04
Packaged: 2018-08-18 20:07:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 24,536
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8174422
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SEABlRD/pseuds/SEABlRD
Summary: It's where my demons hide, it's where my demons hide---a canon-divergent AU where Khadgar hides a dark reason why he left the Kirin Tor. Battling both the orcs and his past, he must overcome the corruption of the fel before Azeroth falls.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This... this started out as a drabble D:
> 
> also here's a [[playlist of songs](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLVe6Qmx5ysdSLzFjJM7XY5XnTs8s2vb4I)] that inspired me, in no particular order
> 
> a warning: the ""memories"" scattered between the scenes aren't in any specific order, they're kinda picked here and there. if it confuses you please tell me \\( ;v; )/

__ _ One of the first, clearest memories Khadgar can recall is pink. Pink and all kinds of purple, surrounding him on all sides. Bright streaks of blue fill his peripheral vision and his head jerks to track them. The noise he makes is primal, confusion and fear filling his entire being. His eyes widen, darting back and forth for any sign of comfort, and finding none. _

__ _ After a long struggle, many days and nights of being held at arm’s length and starved, he finally feels warmth fill his mouth. He drinks greedily, as any newborn would if they’d been denied food for so long, and feels life flood his body.  _

__ _ The second clearest memory in his mind is of the sky, and feeling it fall out from under him. _

\----- 

The ride to Goldshire is unpleasant, to say the least. Clinging to the Stormwind army commander’s back for dear life and being roughly bounced around on the back of a disgruntled gryphon isn’t Khadgar’s preferred mode of transportation, but some circumstances call for sacrifices to be made. Comfort, and the ability to walk properly, comes second to the urgency of removing the corruption of the fel magic in Azeroth.

Night is well past fallen when the pair finally make it to Goldshire. The commander, Lothar, seeks out the king while Khadgar trails behind him. People from all walks of life are gathered in the small village; understandable, since it’s often known as a hub of resources for travelers seeking all sorts of… services. 

Voices fill the air, ranging from shouts to murmurs, as they approach the Lion’s Pride Inn, where King Llane set up a makeshift war room. Maps and compasses are laid out across the tavern’s tables, held down with empty tankards and glasses. King Llane Wrynn, himself, is bent over the far end of the table, deep in discussion with two soldiers. The queen is not far off, organizing some more soldiers to set up a watch around the town in case the strange, brutal invaders make it this far.

“We need more information!” the soldier to the King’s right says, voice high pitched in desperation. “We have no idea what we’re up against! Four garrisons have been levelled in just under two days, we cannot let this keep on.”

The King rubs his eyes and straightens, catching sight of Lothar entering the Inn. He waves halfheartedly and calls out. “Lothar, please tell me  _ you _ have something that can help.”

“Actually,” Lothar says smugly, though the humor is dry in his voice. “I do. Llane, this is Khadgar. He tells me that there’s a dark magic invading Azeroth.”

Khadgar peers around the taller man, taking in the sight before him. The map on the table is marked with three large circles, presumably the locations of the attacks. “That’s right, your Majesty. On the bodies of your fallen men, I found traces of the fel, a dangerous magic.”

“How do you know this?” Llane demands, patience wearing thin after a long day of trying to figure out how to confront this unknown threat.

“Well, I’m a mage, sir. From the Kirin Tor.” Khadgar explains. “The Guardian Novitiate, actually. Or, uh, I was. I... renounced my vows and left the city. There’s no real protocol about it, so I, uh. I just packed up and left.”

Llane , as well as Lothar, raises his eyebrows at that. “You’re a fugitive, then?”

Khadgar visibly winces at that. “No, no sir. I’m not exactly hiding, now, am I?” he points out. The King shrugs.

“Alright. Can you tell me, then, mage, what I’m to do with this ‘fel’ magic?”

Khadgar clears his throat and says: “I’d advise you to summon the Guardian. I’m sure he has the power to expel this kind of magic from Azeroth.” Lothar, the King, and the Queen share a look, an indescribable emotion passing over their faces. 

“Very well.” Llane finally decides. “Please wait outside, Khadgar, we need to talk about something first.”

A young soldier takes Khadgar by his shoulders and leads him outside, despite the mage’s protests. The air of the morning is heavy with dew and birds are starting to sing, far in the forest. Whatever it is the King has to discuss is taking a rather long time, by Khadgar’s standards, and he fidgets back and forth on his feet in boredom. He turns to the soldier beside him and tilts his head curiously.

“So, what’s your name?” he asks. The soldier gives no reply, but under the helmet Khadgar can see two pale eyes. Not unlike Lothar’s, Khadgar thinks. Not like he was particularly interested in the commander’s eyes, of course, he just happened to notice that they were strikingly blue. He tries again. “Come on, I’d like to know who I’m being a burden to. Maybe a mild inconvenience. Certainly an annoyance, if the commander’s attitude toward me is any indication.”

The soldier’s lips quirk in a pathetic attempt not to laugh. Khadgar grins in kind and raps his knuckles against the soldier’s spaulders. “You can tell me what your name is, it’s not like I can use it to curse you or anything. I’m a mage, not a witch.” 

“Sergeant Callan Lothar.” the soldier huffs, straightening his back. The mage blinks, surprised. It seems that his comparison about eyes wasn’t as far-fetched as he thought.  “That’s my name. The commander, Anduin Lothar, he’s my dad. And you’re… Khadgar, yes?”

“... Yes, that’s right.” Khadgar nods. “I’m afraid I don’t have a last name. Or, well, none that I remember, anyway.” Anything he makes to say further is cut off by the voice of the commander interrupting him. 

“Come on, mage.” Lothar barks. “You’re coming with me to get Medivh in Karazhan.”

Khadgar’s mouth opens and closes, but all that comes out are squeaky noises of protest. “I  _ what? _ I said to summon the Guardian, not take me to him!”

“You’ve got a problem with the Guardian?” Lothar demands, crossing his arms. His armor grates against itself, making an unpleasant noise. Khadgar shakes his head.

“Not so much as  _ he _ might have a problem with  _ me _ . I was basically trained to take his job, remember?”

“Nonsense, I’m sure he’ll be fine. He needs to be more social, anyway.” Lothar says and grabs Khadgar by his cloak and pulls him toward the gryphon hitched nearby. The animal glares at him and shakes her great mane, making hissing noises in warning.

“No no no, I’m not getting back on that thing.” Khadgar pulls at Lothar’s grip frantically. Callan comes up behind him and puts a steady hand on his back.

“It’s the absolute fastest way to travel,” Callan reasons. “Unless you want to ride on horseback for the next week.”

“I’d be able to get to Karazhan much faster on my own.” Khadgar grumbles, but heads toward the gryphon anyway. She raises her head haughtily and caws at him. He winces at the noise.

“Are you sure of that? Don’t mages have to have been at the place they want to teleport to, before?” Lothar asks smugly. “Now, I’m no Kirin Tor, but I don’t need all that bookworm math stuff to know that the chances of you having been to Karazhan before are close to zero.”

Khadgar freezes, tensing as though he’d realized something. He looks at Lothar with a mixture of apprehension and nervousness, eyes darting around as though searching for something, before sagging in defeat. “Bookworm… math… stuff…” he laments. “Is that really all you think we do?”

Lothar swings into the gryphon’s saddle with ease, settling himself in. “Aside from throwing around all that hocus pocus stuff? Nope.” he smirks, then reaches down and pulls Khadgar up by the back of his cloak and shirt, like a kitten. He drops Khadgar over the back of the saddle, forcing the mage to scramble into a seated position before the creature launches itself into the air.

\-----

__ _ Strangely enough, Khadgar has no memories of his origins. He remembers Dalaran, and learning magic under the guidance of his mentors, like the benevolent Antonidas, but anything else is lost to him. He does not remember his parents, or his family in general, nor the place of his birth.  _

__ _ All he remembers is a gentle crooning, promises of great power, and darkness. _

\-----

Their arrival at Karazhan is anything but graceful. As soon as the gryphon touches down she bucks viciously and throws Khadgar, who’s grip is already unsteady, to the ground. He lands on his back with a loud  _ thump _ and a breathless, pained wheeze. He struggles to his feet while Lothar descends, much more efficiently, from the gryphon’s back and greets the man who meets him at the door.

“Moroes, is that really you?” Lothar calls. “I don’t believe it. You haven’t aged a day!”

The old man gives a wry grin at the statement. “I can’t say the same for you, Anduin. Is that some grey in your hair, I see?”

The commander returns the grin and pats Moroes on his shoulder. “Most likely,” he says. “I think it gives me some character, don’t you?”

Moroes laughs and beckons him inside, catching sight of Khadgar behind him. The old man eyes Khadgar with suspicion, but Lothar reassures him that he’s here to accompany him to retrieve Medivh.

“Where is everyone?” Lothar asks, looking around. Moroes’ face falls, aging him more than he already is.

“The Guardian prefers the company of silence, these days.” Moroes replies as he leads them into the tower.

Once inside, Khadgar’s eyes grow big and bright. The rows and rows of bookshelves, not to mention the tall stacks of books lying around, have him in an almost dreamlike trance, and he slowly drifts toward one of the shelves. Lothar stops him before he touches anything, however. The commander seems more amused than annoyed, but really it’s hard for Khadgar to tell the difference when it comes to Lothar’s attitude toward him.

Khadgar’s attention is quickly recaptured by the glowing veins of magic that illuminate the expansive library, all flowing upward and pulsing with energy. He marvels at them, reaching out to touch one but thinking better of it at the last second. He swallows nervously. 

“These lead to the Guardian’s font?” he asks, voice shaking. Moroes looks at him curiously.

“Yes. The tower was built-”

“Where the leylines meet.” Khadgar finishes for him, seeming overwhelmed. “All the knowledge kept here… the- the power…”

“Where is he?” Lothar asks and smiles tensely, revealing his impatience. Moroes nods and gestures upward, and Lothar sighs. He turns to Khadgar and gives him a stern look. “Wait here, I’ll be right back.”

He follows Moroes up the staircase, already feeling his legs protest the many, many stairs he knows are waiting for him. As an afterthought, before he forgets, he leans over the bannister and calls to Khadgar: “By the way, try not to touch anything.”

Khadgar looks up at him with wide, almost sad eyes, but nods anyway. Lothar watches him for a few seconds, then nods and continues his ascent. Khadgar remains rooted where he is for about a minute before he launches himself at the nearest bookshelf with fervor. 

The first shelf he gets his hands on has a multitude of books about all the kinds of spells that mages can cast. Some spells involve arcane magic, which he is already very familiar with, and some spells are frost-based. He only knows a few good frost spells, just the ones with enough practicality for him, such as frost nova for incapacitating his enemies, but he doesn’t like the magic type enough to look further into it. The last type of magic is fire magic. Khadgar hesitates before opening these spells.

He holds the book nervously, eyes glossing over the pages more than reading them. He flips through the book distractedly, stopping on a page about a spell that makes the user breathe fire when he hears something move behind him. He freezes, suddenly aware that he’s reading books that very much do not belong to him, and hastily puts it away. He peers around the row of shelves.

“G- Guardian?” he asks, following the mysterious presence that he feels more than sees. It leads him in winding paths through the library, before disappearing in front of his eyes into one of the shelves. He hurries after it, eyes roving over the books for the one that the presence might have disappeared into. 

Some interesting titles jump out at him, such as  _ What the Titans Knew? _ And another one that catches his eye is  _ The Earthmother: A Practical Guide To Druidism, _ along with  _ Dreaming with Dragons: The True History of The Aspects of Azeroth. _ He skims over a book called  _ Walking Through Worlds _ when he feels his left forearm tingling.

He draws his sleeve up, surprised to find that the brand of the Kirin Tor on his arm is alight with energy. The eye glows brighter and dimmer as he moves his arm around, and his gaze snaps to the bookshelf. He raises his arm and moves it along the shelf, feeling the brand glow as it approaches…. Something. It burns, almost blinding, when he stops in front of an old, weathered book with no title. There are metal decorations along its spine and, when Khadgar pulls it out, he finds gems pressed into the thick leather of the front. Excited, he pulls the tome from the shelf and begins to open it.

The sound of footsteps approaching alarms him, and he shoves the book in the pocket of his cloak and dives between the shelf and the wall. The hazy purple glow of a ley vein fills the cramped hiding space, heating Khadgar’s side closest to it. Its light is duller than the others, but it pulses strong, steadily, with raw energy. 

Khadgar stares at it, transfixed; he feels a pit, deep within himself, empty and hungering. He falls into an almost intoxicated state, feeling his heart beat in time with the throbbing light. He reaches a hand toward the vein slowly, trembling.

Before he can even come within an inch of the ley vein, a hand pulls him from his hiding spot and slams him into the shelves. Khadgar lets out a pained cry, his spine giving an unhealthy twinge at the rough treatment. He feels the warm breath of his assailant close to his face, and looks fearfully into the eyes of the Guardian.

“What business do you have here?” Medivh demands, voice low. “Come to stake your claim on Karazhan already? Or are you here for something… more?”

Khadgar’s eyes widen at the Guardian’s knowing tone. Medivh smiles almost cruelly. “Don’t think I don’t know who you are, Novitiate. News travels swiftly among mages, even as isolated as I am.”

“No, Guardian, I swear to you I-” he has no room to make excuses when Medivh whirls quickly and throws him at the marble column of the staircase with surprising force. Khadgar outright howls in pain, feeling something in him  _ crack _ with the impact. He tumbles to the floor unhindered, and he collapses in a heap. He watches, wincing and holding himself, as Medivh stalks toward him furiously.

“Weak.” the Guardian sneers. “You’re running low on magic, aren’t you? You’re nowhere as dangerous as they made you out to be.”

“Guardian, I didn’t want to come here, I swear.” Khadgar pleads, holding his hand out defensively but no blue of spellcasting dances around it. “I told them to summon you, that you should be the one to explain it.”

“Explain what?” Medivh stops just inches from where Khadgar lies prone on the ground. Lothar finally comes down the stairs, alarmed at the shout he’d heard. He’s completely flabbergasted to find his friend standing over Khadgar, who pants and groans like he just got a good thrashing. 

“The fel!”

Medivh freezes at the word, a somber expression coming over his face. “In Azeroth?” he asks. Khadgar nods hesitantly, still wheezing for breath.

“In the barracks, one of the bodies.” 

There is a long moment of silence between the three of them, allowing Khadgar enough time to catch his breath. Lothar stares between the two mages, uncertain of how to approach the situation at hand. He opts for the safest route, the one that doesn’t question why his childhood friend tossed around a runaway mage, maybe a petty criminal at most, like a cat playing with it’s prey.

“What is the fel, exactly?” Lothar asks, sounding much quieter than he’d have liked. Medivh gives no indication that he hears or acknowledges his presence at all, until he speaks again.

“It is a dark magic, unlike any other. It feeds on life itself and pollutes the user, twisting everything it touches.” the Guardian breathes. “It promises everything, but takes everything in return. There is no place for the fel in Azeroth.”

He draws his heavy, deep red robe around him and strides past Khadgar without bearing the young mage a second glance. “You did well, bringing this to me. I will go.” he says, and disappears into the library. 

Khadgar grimaces and begins to heave himself up on his own but is surprised by Lothar, who appears at his side and pulls him up. The commander gives him a look that burns with curiosity, but Khadgar has no answers for him. Or, well, none that would do the man any good to hear. 

He looks down at his feet and shuffles after the Guardian, leaving Lothar behind to wonder just what in all hells happened.

\-----

__ _ Khadgar had been wandering across the countryside for a good long while, now. It’s been nearly a year since he’d… left Dalaran. He disguised himself and hid in the shadows of the less than savory parts of the towns and cities he traveled through. Nobody found him, so far, and nobody recognized him. _

__ _ Good, he thought. He couldn’t live with himself if somebody saw him for who he was. A tempting smell wafted through the air, warm and mouthwatering, but Khadgar shoved his hunger down and scowls into the hood of his cloak. Why should he eat when his very existence is a hindrance, among other things, to everybody around him? _

__ _ He felt blue spark to life in his lungs when a large man approached him with a drunken smirk and lewd words, but bit down on the spell. He couldn’t afford to waste mana, not when he was already so weak. _

__ _ He instead parted ways with the drunk man by planting his fist into the other’s face. _

\-----

Their arrival back in Stormwind goes about as well as one would expect out of a Guardian, a green mage, and a soldier who definitely prefers to be as far away from magic as possible. Medivh, of course, looks fine after teleporting, which is to be expected since it  _ was _ his spell to begin with. Khadgar is disoriented at best, while Lothar has his eyes closed and appears to be feeling something between vertigo and nausea. 

There’s a brief ruckus, a mix of shouting and the metallic noise of armor moving about, until the King’s voice tells everybody to calm down. Medivh strides toward the throne, without hesitation. He lets go of his staff, Atiesh, and Khadgar scrambles to catch it before it hits the floor.

“Medivh! Long time no see, you magic bastard.” Llane booms, pulling the Guardian into a tight, overjoyed hug. “How have you been?”

“I’ve been well. I’m afraid I can’t say the same for the kingdom, though.” Medivh replies seriously, breaking out of the hug early. The King’s face grows somber. 

“You’re right, as always.” he nods and leads Medivh to the war room. “Come, help us figure out how to fix this… problem of ours.”

The others trail after them a little farther back. Lothar gives the Khadgar a  _ look _ and walks past him, leaving him behind with the Queen. She gives Khadgar a kind smile and falls in step beside him.

“How did you like Karazhan?” she asks. “I hear it’s quite grand. Were the servants kind to you?”

Khadgar blinks owlishly at her. “I’m sorry?” he asks. “There wasn’t anybody else there besides the Guardian, and the man named Moroes.”

“Is that so? The way Anduin always talked about it, I thought there would be more staff present.” the Queen admits.

“Well, to be fair, Moroes  _ did _ mention that the Guardian preferred to be alone. Maybe he fired them?” Khadgar offers, nearly missing walking into a nearby pillar. Atiesh, still in his hand, clacks against the floor as uses it to regain his balance. He feels a sharp pain in his ribs, toward his spine, and he immediately recalls the rough treatment he’d gotten back at Karazhan. He contains his wince, though, so that the Queen doesn’t notice it.

She raises a hand to her mouth and chews her lip, deep in thought. “All of them, though?” she asks. She holds the door to the war room open for Khadgar, since Lothar forgets to do so. She stares at her brother’s back in disapproval.

“I wouldn’t know. Thank you, your Majesty.” Khadgar says as he steps in, and holds the door open for her in return. The Queen laughs, a nice, chimelike sound, pulling past him and making her way to the war table.

“Please just call me Taria,” she replies. “I have a feeling we will become very close, given the situation at hand. Being too formal will be very awkward after a while.”

Khadgar considers this for a moment, nervously. If he had the choice, he would spend the least amount of time here as possible. Enough to take care of the fel problem, and then leave. But, as with most plans, there’s always the chance that things will go south, and it would be best if he stuck around for a while. 

“That makes sense,” he says, finally. He stands beside Taria, looking down at the map on the table. It’s much more detailed than the one he saw in Goldshire, with figurines and raised topography. The placement and strategies in place are lost on him, and the discussion quickly loses his attention.

Around the dim-lit room are weapons and shields of all kinds, glinting with steel and gold. Khadgar drifts toward them, enchanted, unnoticed by the party at the war table. Sunlight filters in through a small window on the far wall, and the light reflected from the weaponry creates dazzling patterns on the ceiling. Khadgar traces a shield reverently, admiring how it casts a shine against the swords near it. 

“... What  _ are _ we going to do about…. What’s his name?” Llane’s voice floats over to him, drawing him out of his mind. He turns to find every pair of eyes locked on him.

“Khadgar, sire.” he replies smoothly. Or, it would have been smooth if he didn’t forget he still has Atiesh in his hand and accidentally hits a rack of shields with it. He winces, and stills the ringing with his hand, but it’s too late and half the room sighs in exasperation. 

“He will be coming with us.” Medivh states, sounding disappointed, though that might have been Khadgar’s imagination playing tricks on him.

\-----

__ _ He remembers Antonidas gently reprimanding him for setting a carpet in the library on fire. It had been an accident, and was put out rather swiftly, but the damage was still there. Khadgar hung his head in shame. It was difficult enough for him to focus when his stomach lamented his hunger noisily, even more so when he was trying new spells.  _

__ _ Don’t practice your abilities indoors, Antonidas had told him. Regular mages could manage testing spells in the library, but not mages like Khadgar.  Mages like Khadgar are special, with more raw power than the others that needed to be tamed. _

__ _ And Khadgar knew this, he just wanted to feel included with the other students. They always looked at him funny, especially when he went to go practice in the small courtyard behind the academy.  _

__ _ Many times before, and after, did Khadgar wonder why he couldn’t just be a regular mage. _

\-----

With a handful of horses, a small scouting party, and a wooden cart for the anticipated capture of one of the ‘unstoppable beasts’, Lothar leads the way out of the city and toward the last known location that has been attacked. Reliant, Lothar’s personal horse, advances at a slow canter down the cobblestone road. Khadgar and Medivh, on their own horses, follow him closely. The other soldiers, and the cart,  make up the rear of the party.

The citizens of Stormwind who came to see them off are gathered on both sides of the road, leading all the way down to the front gate. They cheer and salute to the soldiers as they pass by, delighted to see something being done about the mysterious attacks.

Little do they know that the soldiers know about as much as the civilians do regarding the beasts and how to deal with them. 

Once they party leaves the city, Medivh pulls to the front and leads them into the forest. Khadgar winces at the movement of the horse below him, feeling his ribs jostle with it. Barely an hour of traveling passes before the Guardian slows his horse first to a trot, then a full halt. Lothar quickly raises a fist, signaling for the others to stop as well. 

The scene before them is not pleasant. Broken pitchforks and shovels, among other improvised weapons, litter the ground among broken and overturned carts. Dark red blood pools in the dirt and reflects on the trees, and heavy, broken branches are scattered around the whole area. Lothar can’t even imagine what kind of force it must have taken to break them clean off the trees to begin with. Strangely enough, however, there are no bodies to be found.

A bit farther ahead, a tree smokes with glowing, emerald embers.

“It cannot be…” Medivh mumbles under his breath. He dismounts and approaches the tainted tree carefully, with Khadgar close behind. The Guardian plants Atiesh in the ground and Khadgar, once again, moves to catch it before it falls over. 

While Medivh inspects the strange burn, Khadgar and the others wander around the site in search of anything that could be of use. The woods are mysteriously void of sound, no birds or insects can be heard other than the movement of the soldiers inspecting the site. Khadgar follows a particularly heavy trail of blood and finds the unfortunate victim a little farther in the tall grass. The man’s eyes are frozen open in fear, and Khadgar closes them with a mournful sigh.

Until his hand touches the dead man’s skin. He freezes, feeling the warmth still emanating from the corpse. His eyes widen in realization of what that means, and he whirls on himself despite the pain in his ribs, sprinting back toward the soldiers.

“Guardian!” he yells out in warning, panicked, but it’s too late. The forest fills with an awful, earsplitting roar, and massive beasts drop down from the canopy. Two soldiers are sent flying by a hammer about half as big as they are, and one of the gigantic creatures lobs a horse at two more as though it were throwing a ball. The creatures’ green-tinged skin gleams with sweat and blood, and they low with laughter as they cut through the battle with animalistic ferocity.

There is absolute chaos all around, soldiers are cut directly in half by axes as tall as them, and the soldiers who managed to fight back even briefly found themselves quickly overwhelmed by the sheer brute strength of the beasts. Wolves like bears tear through soldiers as though they were nothing but chew-toys.

Lothar’s shield manages to connect with one of the monsters’ face, causing it to reel backward. He quickly swings his sword in a high arc, slicing clean through it’s neck. Well, that’s good, at least. They’re not as unstoppable as the rumors made them out to be.

Khadgar searches for Medivh, and a terrified wheeze leaves him when he finds the Guardian frozen stock-still. His eyes are misted and train on the carnage before him, but no spell leaves his lips. Khadgar scrambles to his side and casts a domelike shield around the two of them. An unexpectedly loud  _ BANG _ fills the clearing and Khadgar almost drops the spell out of sheer fright.

Something strikes the dome with a loud, dull  _ thud _ , and Khadgar, who is already tightly wound, jumps at the noise. Not even a full meter away from him, one of the gargantuan creatures presses it’s dark tan face against his shield and peers inside. Odd, but it’s eyes don’t seem as angry or bloodthirsty as the others, and it instead looks at Khadgar almost with curiosity.

Out of all the terrifying things about these beasts, the thought that they might be any degree of intelligent scares him the most.

“Guardian!” Khadgar repeats, more frantically. Medivh’s eyes clear of the blank haze and he begins chanting lowly. Soon, tendrils of light flow from his hands and form an array of sigils around him. Green lightning pull from the creatures’ bodies, and they howl with pain and rage. Around them the monsters fall one by one, as though pulled to the dirt by the green bolts coming from them. Their full bodies wither before Khadgar’s very eyes, and he watches the spectacle unfold in a mix of awe and horror.

“They’re dying!” someone yells, triumphantly. The soldiers attack with renewed strength, ensuring the death of the foul beasts. 

“Just the green ones,” another soldier warns, and the remaining Stormwind forces turn on the monsters left alive. The largest one is missing an entire hand, and it bellows in rage. 

Lothar fires off a few more deafening blasts from the weapon in his hands, punching a hole directly through the chest of another creature. The brown one near Khadgar’s shield lets out an anguished roar and catches it’s fallen companion. 

Before long, the beasts are retreating on their massive wolves and on stolen horses. Khadgar misses what happens afterward as he’s distracted by a groan of pain from beside him

“Guardian?” he asks and releases his shield, rushing to the man to steady him. “Guardian, what did you do? I was right. It’s the fel, isn’t it?”

Medivh shakes his concern off and stands on his own, shakily drawing runes in the dirt. “I must return to Karazhan.” he states. “Get the rest of these soldiers back to Stormwind.”

Then, as an afterthought, he adds, “You did well today,” and disappears in a flash of arcane blue. Khadgar stares at the empty space Medivh left, ignoring the heavy sound of hooves cantering around. 

“Where did he go?” Lothar demands, out of breath. 

Khadgar looks at the commander, trembling and mouth dry. He takes a breath to steady himself and swallows before replying. “Karazhan.” he croaks.

“Fuck, alright. Well, we still need prisoners. Where’s your horse?”

“They took my horse.” Khadgar announces after a brief glance around the clearing. The devastated bodies of the soldiers and beasts strewn around the clearing makes his gut twist.

Lothar gives him a withering glare and gallops off with a “Really? Just stay there, then.”

Khadgar watches him off for a moment then turns to one of the colossal husks on the ground. He kneels beside it and puts a hand to it’s uncomfortably moist skin. He can feel it, still, even after… whatever it was that Medivh had done. No green mist comes from the creature’s mouth when he tests it, but he can still feel the fel pulsing in the its veins, tugging at any life it can reach. It’s too weak to pull a significant amount of energy, but even the gentle pressure is enough to make Khadgar’s stomach do flips inside him. 

Around him, the remaining soldiers help the wounded and pick up the dead for the ride home. It should be over, but Khadgar doesn’t feel like it’s over. He reaches his sense outward, listening to the forest. No buzzing or bird song comes back to him, and it’s the only warning he gets before he hears something rush at him from the trees.

He already has a spell on his lips as he whips around, the movement causing his already aching ribs to protest violently. He casts followed by a cry of agony, remaining conscious only for long enough to see a skinny green creature trapped in his frost nova, and collapses.

\-----

__ _ Dalaran was a pleasant place to study, surrounded by as much knowledge and power as one could get their hands on. Khadgar, for one, took as many opportunities to learn new things as he could. One thing less pleasant, however, was trying to have a reasonable debate with the teachers. _

__ _ Why should I learn Slowfall? He’d demanded. I already know there’s no way I’ll ever fall to my death, teach me something more useful. _

__ _ The teachers hadn’t been happy with him for that. It’s standard for all mages, they told him. You will learn the spell with everybody else, or have your library privileges revoked.  _

__ _ So Khadgar learned a useless spell, if only so that he could keep researching new spells on his own. He always did work best when he was defying his elders. _

\-----

When Khadgar wakes up, he’s lying on his back in possibly the most comfortable bed he’s ever had the privilege of experiencing. Either that, or his exhaustion is clouding his accurate judgement of the mattress. He takes a deep breath, hindered by something wrapped around his chest, and he looks down to see bandages covering his entire upper torso. 

“You’re finally awake.” A voice says, and Khadgar looks up to find Callan standing in the doorway holding what seems to be a pile of either blankets or towels. The young soldier steps inside and puts the stack of cloth at the foot of Khadgar’s bed, taking a seat in one of the chairs nearby. “You had some pretty nasty fractures in your ribs, and one of them was even broken. It’s a miracle you were even well enough to stand up, let alone ride with the scouting party!”

Khadgar listens to Callan tell him about the injuries, pressing his hand against his side tentatively. No pain greets him and he sighs in relief.

“Aunt Taria ordered the best priests in Stormwind to come heal you,” the boy continues. “It’s a good thing too, because it turns out you’re real stubborn when it comes to healing.”

“And to eating, apparently.” Lothar adds as he walks in as well. “The priests tried to give you some food while you were unconscious and you couldn’t keep any of it down. Made a real mess of the room about it, too.”

Khadgar winces and looks around the room as though he could still find evidence of his sickness. Thankfully, no stains or smells can be found. 

“How long was I out for?” he asks, sitting up. Callan and Lothar share a look that confuses him.

“You were out for almost a whole day, kid.” Lothar says, finally. “Scared us shitless, honestly. Don’t ever do that again.”

_ Kid _ , Khadgar mouths, frowning. Lothar ignores it and instead decides to fill the mage in on what he’d missed while he was out. 

The creature that he’d been ambushed by, as it turns out, could speak the human tongue and told the King about the army of the monstrous beasts (orcs, Lothar tells him) that came through to Azeroth from another world, through a “great gate”, as she called it. She mentioned that they were hidden somewhere in a swampy land, which Lothar theorizes might be the Black Morass. Garona, the female orc Khadgar had trapped, offered to lead them to the camp to spy on the Horde forces, as she calls them.

Khadgar turns this new information in his head, reeling. The idea of even more of the orcs - an entire warband! - bringing the corruption of the fel into Azeroth makes him want to be sick again. On top of everything, Medivh is acting strange, stranger than he usually is, as Lothar informs him, and refused to accompany him and Garona on their spying mission. Khadgar presses a hand against his forehead, already feeling a headache coming on.

“Okay, so when do we head out?” he asks, and Lothar just laughs.

“What makes you think you’re coming with us?” the commander fires back. “The priests say you’re not allowed to move for a few days, at least.”

Khadgar bristles at that. “I’m more than capable of going with you!” he protests. “Besides, what if the orcs catch you? You have no way of defending yourself against the fel without me or Medivh around.”

He, Lothar, and Callan stare at each other in tense silence until Lothar heaves a sigh and makes a distracted gesture with his hand. “Alright, fine. But only because you’re good at that magic stuff. May I remind you that you’ll be delaying us a whole few days?”

Khadgar shakes his head vehemently. “I’ll be ready to go in just one day.” he says, determined. Lothar is surprised but plays it off as annoyed disbelief instead.

“If you say so, kid.” he presses on the last word, making Khadgar grimace. Both Lothar and Callan head out to train some with the troops, laughing at the mage’s indignation.

Khadgar glares after them for a long while before he decides to get up. The first thing he does is inspect the stack that Callan brought in with him earlier, which is neither blankets or towels, but a fresh change of clothes and a new cloak of the same colour as his other one. Likely because the clothes he had on the last time he was awake were filthy and probably stank more than the orcs, who definitely did not smell like flowers and perfume.

He puts the clothes on glady, reminding himself to thank whoever got them for him, and pokes his head out the door. There’s a guard outside his room, and she looks back at him with a composed look. 

“Would you like anything, Khadgar?” she asks. “I have orders to not allow you to do any strenuous activities and to keep you out of trouble for as long as you’re in the castle.”

In the castle? He thought they’d brought him to an inn, maybe the barracks at most. But to be lent a room and  _ cared for _ under the King’s own roof, that is a humbling thing to find out. Khadgar blushes slightly, suddenly very embarrassed to have been so much trouble to the Stormwind royals. 

“Uh, is there a library nearby?” he asks lamely. “I’m not even awake a whole hour and I’m already bored. Reading something would be good to pass the time.”

The soldier doesn’t reply verbally but nods and motions for him to follow her. She leads him down twisting hallways and, for a moment, Khadgar is almost certain she’s trying to get him dreadfully lost in the castle and then abandon him where he can’t get out, but eventually she stops in front of two large, wooden doors and stands to the side of them.

“Thank you,” Khadgar bows to her and pushes the doors open. The sight that greets him is more than marvellous, especially after having been away from a proper library in so long. 

Of course, he thinks bitterly, the library in Karazhan would be much lovelier, if only the ghost of his battered ribs allowed him to regard the memory in a more positive light. To be fair, Medivh did have a valid reason to be wary of him.

Or he  _ would  _ have, had Khadgar been any stronger than he was, but Khadgar also isn’t stupid enough to threaten a Guardian. 

Shaking his head free of any more negative thoughts, the mage almost skips to the first shelf and begins looking over various titles, picking a few off and setting them on a nearby table. About ten minutes, and two stacks of books later, Khadgar settles himself into a chair and begins pouring over the tomes he chose.

He has no idea how much time has passed, but he breaks out of his reading trance when the heavy doors to the library slam shut. He looks up and is surprised to see Lothar coming toward him.

“How long have you been in here, bookworm?” the man asks, looking around the library in amusement. “Find anything interesting? Something that can help us against the orcs?”

“Hello to you too, commander.” Khadgar says snidely. “Nothing of real importance, I’m afraid. And I’ve been here since just after you last saw me, actually. The soldier outside was kind enough to show me the way.”

Lothar nods. “She’s a good woman, that one.” he agrees and pulls out the chair across from Khadgar, dropping into it heavily. The chair makes a sound of protest at the treatment.

“What are you here for?” Khadgar asks exasperatedly. “Surely you have better things to do than watch me read for the rest of the day.”

Lothar flashes him what Khadgar’s come to recognize as a ‘kiss-my-ass’ kind of grin. He doesn’t reply and sinks further into the chair, slouching in a way that is definitely unhealthy for his spine. Khadgar watches him in silence, internally counting down from ten.

“Alright, since you’re not going to leave you might as well pick a book for yourself because you’re going to be here for a long time.”

Khadgar returns to the book he was reading, an old tome in an almost-dead language about leylines, ignoring the movement across the table when Lothar stands up, walks away, and walks back. He does finally look up when he hears the sound of a book hitting the table and finds that the commander actually took his advice. The familiar title of the book makes him snort, however.

“ _ Dreaming with Dragons _ , really?” Khadgar shakes his head condescendingly. “I never pictured you would be the type to be interested in dragons. Thought you’d go more for the war journals and strategy stuff.”

Lothar shrugs. “Dragons are interesting.” he says simply. “And powerful! It’s said that dragons were responsible for creating Azeroth, alongside the Titans, you know. That almost makes them like gods! Each flight has their own strengths and weaknesses, of course, but they’re no less powerful for it.”

“That’s true, I suppose.” Khadgar scratches his chin, pensive. “The blue dragons are the best for arcane magic, while the green dragons lean more toward nature magic, for example.”

“I never picture you would be the type to be interested in dragons.” Lothar parrots back, sarcastic, and Khadgar throws him a glare. 

“I would hope I’m interested in dragons, considering many students and professors in Dalaran are dragons.” he scoffs. “Malygos, the Blue Dragonflight leader is allowing the Kirin Tor to access the arcane only under the watch and tutelage of his most trusted emissaries, after all.”

Lothar’s eyebrows shoot right up into his hairline at that. He lets out an impressed whistle and flips through the book absentmindedly. “Didn’t know that,” he admits. “Rather impressive that you were taught by the masters of arcane magic, themselves.”

Khadgar makes a funny noise, as though he was saying something but cut himself off at the last moment. Lothar looks at him strangely but doesn’t ask, making a face and burying his head into the dragon book.

There is at least fifteen minutes of blessed silence in which Khadgar finishes the chapter he was reading in peace, but Lothar decides it’s time to open his fat mouth and start talking again, much to Khadgar’s annoyance.

“So what’s your favourite flight?” Lothar asks, not looking up from the book. “If you’re such a dragon expert, i mean. Which ones do you like best? Don’t say the blue dragons because of their arcane magic, because that’s cheating.”

“That’s not fair.” Khadgar counters. “What if I like the blue dragons best because I like the color of their scales?”

“Then you’ll have to pick another color.” Lothar says cheerfully. Khadgar wants to feel annoyed but he’s too distracted by the question to feel anything other than indecisiveness. 

“I can’t pick one.” He declares. “You said it yourself, they’re all good.”

“Yeah, but you can still have a favourite one. Mines red, because they represent balance and protecting.”

“Well I like them all, so too bad.”

Lothar has an amusing look on his face that screams ‘why must you be like this’ and he sighs again, putting the book on the table open. The page he has it on has a diagram of a dragon’s fire-producing system. 

“Alright, here’s a better question then. Which is your  _ least _ favourite flight?” he asks, and this time Khadgar doesn’t even bat an eye before answering.

“Black dragons.” he says, coldly. Lothar doesn’t bother hiding his shock at the way he almost spit the answer as though it were venom.

“Black dragons are certainly not a good bunch.” the commander agrees, but Khadgar shakes his head.

“Black dragons are nothing but power-hungry, senseless barbarians who would stop at nothing to achieve their own ends, even if it means sacrificing the lives of thousands of innocents.” the mage hisses. “Black dragons can leave this world entirely and will not be missed.” He picks up his own book and slumps into his chair, adamantly ignoring Lothar and everything else.

Lothar, for his part, thinks about what Khadgar says and finds an eerie similarity between his description of the black dragons and Garona’s description of the orc army, and can’t help but agree with the mage once again.

\-----

__ _ Everybody in Dalaran knew better than to argue with Professor Cyanigosa. True to her nature, she was a draconian woman and an even more tyrannical teacher. However, her ‘trial by fire’, sometimes meaning literal fire, methods have been proven more effective than most of the other professors’ lessons, making her classes a hard-won but well-deserved pass. _

__ _ Khadgar liked her the most because, out of all his professors, she presented him with the most challenging work and pressed him to become a better mage.  _

__ _ She liked him quite a bit, as well, and took him under her metaphorical wing for a long time until he’d surpassed what her class usually demanded which, admittedly, was a lot to begin with. _

__ _ He felt as though he’d lost a part of his family, or what he imagined a family must be like, when he stepped out of her classroom for the last time. _

\-----

Five of them depart early the next morning; Lothar, Varis, Karos, Garona, and (to everybody’s surprise) a fit and bright-eyed Khadgar. They pick horses that are comfortable with mountainous and rocky terrain in anticipation of the path they were to take.

The journey to the Black Morass is not a short one, and all five horses are fitted with saddlebags heavy with rations and waterskins. Khadgar’s horse has an extra pouch for the two books he decided to bring with him, as he’s sure that none of the soldier talk will interest him. He’s almost ready to get on his horse when a hand on his shoulder stops him. He looks at the offending hand, and then to the face of the hand’s owner. Lothar, though visibly tired with dark bags under his eyes, gives him the most sincere look Khadgar’s ever seen from him.

“I forgot to give this to you, yesterday.” the commander says, pressing a rectangular shape into Khadgar’s hands. “It’s what I went to the library for, looking for you. I completely forgot about it until this morning.”

Khadgar brings the shape to his face and gasps when he realizes what it is. The book he ‘borrowed’ from Karazhan! The look on his face must betray just how relieved he is to have it back, because Lothar chuckles at his reaction

“I picked it up after you passed out in the forest.” he explains. “You must’ve dropped it or something during the fight, I guess. Figured it must be important to you if you had it with you all the time.”

Yeah, he had it ‘all the time’. Khadgar pulls the man into a one-armed hug, thanking him profusely for returning the book to him, and turning back to his horse distractedly to mount up. He kicks his horse into a slow walk around the courtyard to get her warmed up.

Lothar remains where he stands, frozen on the spot. The skin under his clothes tingles with the phantom pressure of the hug he still feels. He’s more than surprised that Khadgar, who had been pretty awkward and distant before, would hug him, of all people. The book must be very important, Lothar concludes, because the idea of Khadgar showing any form of affection or camaraderie toward him otherwise is just ludicrous. 

Lothar is the last to mount up and he takes Reliant on one quick run around the courtyard then orders for the party to move out. They follow tightly as he leads them through Elwynn, and out of the corner of his eye he spots Khadgar looking deeply perplexed and barely holding onto the reins of his horse in favor of absorbing the book in his hands through his eyes. Lothar snorts, it’s a good thing the horse is well-trained or Khadgar might have found himself in the dirt long before he even reached the gates of Stormwind.

The pace they ride at is decent, but not fast enough to exhaust their mounts. Nevertheless, by the time the party reaches Deadwind Pass, the horses are panting and gleaming with sweat. Lothar, Karos, and Varis dismount and lead the horses through the pass on foot, leaving Garona and Khadgar seated. Not that Khadgar would notice, since he’s about halfway into the book he’s reading, but he’s much too concentrated for any of them to bother, anyway.

They come across a wide outcropping just as dusk falls over them, and Lothar declares that it’s time to rest for the night. He orders Karos to manage the horses, and Varis to set up a campfire.

“And bookworm,” he finishes, raising his voice so that Khadgar hears him. “Take the first watch.”

Garona dismounts with a confused but amused look on her face, which Khadgar doesn’t miss as he slides off his horse. He glares at Lothar and replies, “respectfully,  _ commander _ , my name is Khadgar.”

Lothar clutches his chest dramatically and bows to him. “My apologies,  _ Khadgar _ .” he mocks. “I thought we bonded enough when I  _ didn’t _ put you in a cell for trespassing. Now,  _ take the first watch _ .”

Or when they’d spent the better half of a day reading together in comfortable, only slightly awkward silence, Khadgar thinks, but he bites his tongue and shuffles toward the campfire in preparation to take the watch.

Darkness falls over the Pass, and moonlight floods the cold stone. Somewhere in the distance, the ominous call of a coyote bounces through the canyon. Food and drink are passed around the fire, and all the party eats eagerly except for Khadgar. He stares at the lump of bread in his hands and absently turns it over, rubbing crumbs off of it periodically. Varis watches him with an annoyed expression on his face, but doesn’t mention it. It’s Garona who eventually speaks up, her tone accusing.

“You do not eat?” she demands. “Some would go weeks without food, and yet you will not eat a piece of fresh bread that has been  _ given _ to you.”

Khadgar looks at her with owlish eyes. He has the decency to look chastised as he puts the bread back into the bag it came from and return to his seat. The four around the fire look at him in confusion, and he squirms under their judgemental gazes.

If he hadn’t been sitting so close, Lothar would have missed what Khadgar says under his breath, but he’s just close enough to pick up the echos of the mage’s words.

“ _ Sorry… I’m not hungry. _ ”

The words confuse Lothar more than they provide answers. Khadgar’s not hungry? Now that he thinks about it, he doesn’t remember ever seeing Khadgar eat anything at all. The priests having difficulty getting any form of nutrients into the mage’s unconscious body also comes to mind, and he begins to wonder what the hells is wrong with this man. How can he survive without eating?

The question plagues him even after the fire is reduced to glowing embers and Varis, Karos, and Garona are all gone to bed. The commander picks at the leg of chicken he hadn’t finished yet, staring into the remnants of the fire. Khadgar sits alone a little ways off, sitting against a large rock and, thankfully, taking his job as the first watch seriously. Lothar notices that his eyes trail curiously to Garona every so often, and a strange feeling grips at his lungs.

“At least you’re not reading.” The commander teases, and Khadgar makes a funny little jump, startled. 

“He wishes to lie with me” Garona says, surprising both Khadgar and Lothar, who thought she was asleep. 

“What?” Khadgar asks, sounding mighty offended. Lothar stifles a grin at his reaction but feels that ugly feeling tighten in his chest. He remembers that Khadgar is still so young, maybe only a few years older than Lothar’s son, and likely still feels attraction vividly and freely as young men usually do, and with Garona being equally young...

“You would be injured.” Garona continues, and Khadgar sighs deeply.

“I  _ don’t _ want to lie with you.” he shrugs. “You’re not my type.”

Garona shrugs as well. “Good. You would not be an effective mate,” she teases, and Lothar’s chest untangles. He feels almost shamefully relieved that neither are attracted to each other, but he has no idea why.

The commander bursts into loud guffaws at her statement, slapping a hand over his own mouth to silence himself before he wakes the other two soldiers. Garona turns to him with an utterly perplexed look.

“Why do you laugh? You humans seem much too fragile to survive the act. Bones too thin, and brittle. Easy to snap in half. It is a surprise you survive anything.”

The commander clears his throat and gestures to Garona’s body. “You don’t look very different, to me, so how do you survive?”

She looks down at herself and her mood sours. “Broken bones heal stronger.” she says quietly. “Mine are very strong.”

Lothar sobers up instantly, remembering the hulking, massive forms of the other orcs and wondering just what kind of horrors she must have faced during her time with them. The silence that hangs over the fireside is thick with the memories of traumas past and unspoken secrets. 

“My name, ‘Garona’, means ‘cursed’ in orc.” she says nonchalantly, but her voice conceals a tremble of outrage. “My mother was killed for giving birth to me.”

She pulls a string out from under her loaned armor, revealing a thin, cream tusk. “Gul’dan kept me alive. He gave me this, to remember her.”

The concept of keeping a dead relative’s teeth around his neck is repulsive to Lothar, but the keepsake obviously means a lot to the orc and she holds it to the light of the embers reverently. 

She doesn’t miss the undisguised look of envy on Khadgar’s face and she tilts her head at him. He watches her in silence for a few moments before speaking up.

“I don’t remember anything about my parents.” he confesses, quiet. “I was taken in by the Kirin Tor at a young age. It’s an honor, you know, to be accepted and taught by the most prestigious mages in all of Azeroth.”

Khadgar looks at his hands and scowls. “Less so, to…” he trails off and bites his lip, shaking his head. Garona stares at him for a long time before nodding in understanding. There is a silent communion between them, a shared feeling of loss for the families they never had. Lothar awkwardly shifts in his seat and tosses the finished chicken bone  somewhere into the bush.

“What is this, tragic backstory time?” he chuckles, attempting to lighten the mood with the joke. Khadgar looks up and smirks at him, and Lothar feels as though he might have made a mistake.

“Yes, actually.” Khadgar says, sitting up and leaning his back against the stone behind him. “Come on, you must have  _ some _ kind of backstory worth sharing. Tell us about yourself.”

“Really, there’s nothing to tell-”

“You’re the head of the army and you’re best friends with the King and the Guardian. Don’t tell me there’s  _ nothing _ interesting to share with us.” Khadgar rolls his eyes. “You must at least have some great stories about your childhood, getting into trouble together and all that. What about adventures? Did you ever get ambushed by a pack of murlocs?”

“If I tell you my tragic backstory will you-”

“Did you ever fall off a horse? What about a gryphon?! Did you ever fall off a gryphon while it was flying? Have you ever gotten stuck in your armor, before? Did y-”

“My wife died!” Lothar blurts out, more to silence the mage than anything else. Khadgar’s mouth shuts with an audible  _ clack _ . The commander looks around the camp to make sure the others haven’t been woken up by his outburst, then continues much more quietly.

“My wife died, in childbirth.” he clarifies. “It was in the winter, and there was a storm. The priests made it in time to save Callan, but not… not Cally.”

Both Garona and Khadgar nod solemnly, understanding the toll that her death must have had on the man. Khadgar almost looks like he might want to say something, but decides against it. Garona, however, has no such inhibitions.

“You love her.” she says simply. It takes Lothar off-guard, since he usually expects some sort of well-meant words of sympathy, but he appreciates her candor. 

“I did. I still do, really. I loved her as any honest man would love his wife.” Lothar smiles a bit. Khadgar still has nothing to say about it, despite being the one to ask in the first place, but Lothar can’t bring himself to mind. It’s not the mage’s job to feel bad for him, after all.

“Well, that was cheerful.” Lothar pipes up after a good long silence, bidding Garona good night and laying down onto the uncomfortable cot he’d rolled out for himself earlier. In a half hour’s time, Varis will wake up and relieve Khadgar of his post, but that doesn’t matter to Lothar because he’s already drifting into the fog of sleep.

\-----

__ _ Blood filled his mouth when he came to his senses. Blood, and a taste too sweet to be anything of human make. Despite the ache in his stomach being mysteriously gone, he felt as though he would be sick. Khadgar blinked the film from his eyes and thrashed in panic. _

__ _ Something covered his mouth, clamping it shut and preventing him from shouting, speaking, casting, and ridding himself of the vile liquid seeping between his teeth. He recognized the area around him as the secluded courtyard where he usually trained, but instead of it being quiet as it usually was, there was a commotion around him and he craned his neck to look behind himself. _

__ _ All around him were professors and Archmages of the Kirin Tor, frantically discussing and gesturing wildly at him, but he couldn’t hear anything they said for the ringing in his ears. He wiggled on the floor, finding it uncomfortably sticky. To his horror, blood sloshed around him like a mire. A little further away lay two unrecognizable lumps, also surrounded by a thick pool of blood. _

__ _ His eyes must have been as wide as saucers, because they felt like they might pop right out of his skull, but he wasn’t left much time to think about it when a heavy, ornate boot connected with his head and he blacked out once more. _

\-----

Khadgar stares down at the camp before him in horror. Everything Garona said about the orcs is true, except on a much, much larger scale than what she’d mentioned. Farther in the camp, a massive arch stands half-built and surrounded by rudimentary scaffolding. The same one Garona told them about.

The five of them peer over the edge of a small ledge overlooking the bulk of the camp, watching as the orcs mill about between their tents. From this distance, the tents look no bigger than a silver coin, but knowing the size of the orcs they must be absolutely massive. And there are so many of them! 

Khadgar’s brows furrow and a look of anxiety comes over his expression. He covers his mouth and continues watching, though even trying to estimate the sheer number of orcs in the camp makes him dizzy with uncertainty.

There’s movement behind him as Lothar and Varis gallop off into the woods to reach Stormwind as fast as they could to warn the King. Garona fixes the tack on her horse much more slowly, and Karos is trying to fit the rations that Lothar and Varis left behind into the packs of the three remaining horses. 

There is a loud sound followed by something grabbing Khadgar from behind, and he finds himself trapped between a huge hand and an even bigger chest. His heart pounds in his throat and he scratches at the hand uselessly. The skin is rough and smells bad, and Khadgar tries to fight the urge to gag but his body reacts anyway and he tears up from the effort to stop himself from throwing up into his own mouth.

There’s a flash in the back of his mind and suddenly his mouth floods with the phandom taste of iron, the pastel shades of the courtyard tiles marred with dark puddles press against his cheek instead of the orc behind him. He feels an unbearable throb in his skull and cries out in pain. 

Garona whirls at the sound of struggling, coming up short when she sees who it is. Khadgar doesn’t like the look of recognition in her eyes, and immediately thinks the worst. The rough, guttural language of the orcs is exchanged between her and Khadgar’s captor, almost conversational. Garona takes a step forward with a hopeful look in her eye, saying something that sounds like a question.

She must not like the reply she gets because she visibly wilts and nods sadly. Khadgar is released after a moment and he turns to see the orc behind him. To his surprise, he recognizes the orc who watched him from the other side of his dome shield in the fight in the forest.

The massive creature gently pushes a knuckle into Khadgar’s chest, almost friendly-like, and turns to lumber back toward the camp as quietly as any beast as big as it possibly can. Garona watches him go with a resigned sigh, and Khadgar with shock and a little bit of fear. 

“What was that about?” the mage asks, reaching a hand out and leaning against a tree to avoid falling over as his legs threaten to give out from under him. He swallows audibly, taking in a deep breath to calm his nerves.  “What… what did he say?”

Garona doesn’t reply for a long while and Khadgar recognizes the look on her face. It’s the same look that he had on his, when his favourite professor had told him that he could no longer attend her class: bittersweet rejection. 

He allows the orc some time to mourn whatever it was that she lost, instead moving to where Karos lay (hopefully) unconscious near the other two horses. He lets out a relieved sigh when he feels the man exhale and picks him up, propping him against a tree before finishing packing up so that they could head back to Stormwind as soon as he wakes up. 

\-----

_ They locked him in a room with barred windows while they discussed what they were to do with him. Khadgar paced along the walls and almost ate the golden decorations that adorn the room in his agitation.  _

__ _ They were going to kill him, most likely. They’d always said that he was dangerous, unhinged, and it was Antonidas who had advocated for his worth the first time so many years ago. Now, he’s not so sure the elderly Archmage would even bother to speak his name. _

__ _ There is no excuse for what he’d done. He’d gone against the very balance of life and death, with no other explanation for his actions other than he was  _ not in his right mind _.  _

__ _ He felt the hidden pressure of the horns growing in his skull and winced at the feeling. His entire body was much too small, his breaths came in short, rapid bursts as he spiralled into panic. When the door to the room opens he didn’t hesitate to simply deck the person behind it and pushed through the crowd blindly.  _

__ _ He made it to the edge of the island before the Archmages caught up to him and they attempted to freeze him with Frost Novas. They were definitely going to kill him, now, if they weren’t before. He didn’t hesitate to launch himself directly off the side of the floating island, mouth opening to shout the spell that would prevent him from freefalling to his death. _

__ _ Until, of course, somebody in the crowd threw a Counterspell, and for the first time he wished that he paid more attention when the professors were teaching Slowfall. _

\-----

Garona explained that the large brown orc, Durotan, chieftain of the Frostwolf clan, wanted to see Gul’dan, the Horde’s warlock, and the fel taken care of, as well. He wants to meet King Llane to form a pact and take Gul’dan down together. 

Lothar, of course, is about as interested in trusting this Durotan as he was in trusting Khadgar when he first met him, except Durotan can’t be stopped by a hand over his mouth. 

“Llane, don’t do about this.” He urges, shaking the King’s shoulder as though trying to knock some sense into him. “You never know, it could be a trap. We can’t risk you like that! Think of Stormwind, of your _ children _ !”

“I  _ am _ thinking of them, Anduin!” The King exclaims, giving his friend a long-suffering look. “Look, Durotan would not ask for Stormwind’s aid if he thought his clan could take the warlock on their own.”

“What makes you think we stand a better chance? They’re over twice our size in all directions!”

“The opportunity is just too good to pass up,” Llane says and shakes his head sadly. “We already lost so many garrisons… There is no other choice; we must help the Frostwolves in stopping Gul’dan.”

“And what if he’s lying?” Lothar demands.

“Orcs do not lie!” Garona protests. “There is no honor in it.”

Lothar pivots on his heel to give her a condescending sneer. “And where is the ‘honor’ in betraying his own people?” he asks, voice dripping with venom. Garona meets him head-on with a cool expression, to her credit, and replies.

“He is protecting his clan. His enemy is Gul’dan, and the fel, just like yours.” 

Taria speaks up suddenly, surprising the entire room. “How do you know him? Durotan?” she asks, her voice gentle but strong.

Garona thinks about this for a long moment. “He freed me. And he loves his clan. He always put their needs before his own. He is a strong chieftain.”

“A good leader must always earn his people’s trust.” Taria nods, reaching into the folds of her dress. “As we must earn yours, if we expect you to join us.”

The Queen holds something out to the orc: a thin, short blade with a white handle and simple embellishments. Garona looks at it quizzically, then looks back into the Queen’s eyes with the unspoken question.

“To defend yourself.” Taria encourages, and takes Garona’s hand. She presses the small dagger into Garona’s palm and closes her fingers around it. 

Garona draws the blade from its sheath, admiring the weapon. She looks up and her eyes rove around the room in wonder. Every person here knows that she could take them out if she so wished, but they trusted her not to. 

Throat tight, she sheaths the blade and attaches it to the side of her belt.

 

_ When he’d come back to his room earlier, Khadgar had taken off his cloak and hung it up and put the strange, unmarked book onto the small desk in his room and sat down, opening it to the page he’d been reading when before the incident in the Black Morass.  _

_ The book, itself, was unremarkable and likely held thousands of theories and spells, but the one that drew his attention the most was the large drawing of an archway. The structure loomed over a barren horizon, and two hooded figures were penciled in on either side of it’s entrance. In the center of the arch, a dark scribble represented what was likely a portal of some sort. Around it were thousands of small figures holding barbaric weapons. _

_ The arch wasn’t the most concerning part, but rather the fact that he’d seen the exact same one being built in the Black Morass. Is that what Garona meant, when she said that Gul’dan was planning to bring the entire Horde through to this world? With a gate twice the size of a large cathedral? Just how many more orcs could there be left to bring? _

_ Khadgar was looking for theories about the portal, though most of it was written in a language that must be older than even he could understand, when he’d been interrupted by Medivh appearing in his room in a flash of blue. The Guardian stared at the book in his hand with a blank, unmoving expression. His jaw was tight, though, betraying his anger. _

_ “Guardian!” Khadgar said, getting up. He ignored the heat coming from the Guardian as he approached, showing the man the page that he’d been deciphering. “I found this book, and I think it might help with figuring out how to stop the orcs from coming through! Look, there’s this  _ gate- _ ” _

_ “Where did you get this?” Medivh had asked, furious.  Khadgar wilted under his gaze, feeling quite foolish for the thievery now. _

_ “From… From your library in Karazhan.” he admitted. “But, look, we saw this gate being built in the Black Morass. I’ve been trying to put together some clues, and-” _

__ _ Medivh snatched the book out of his hands and Khadgar recoiled in fear. He felt a cold sweat break over his skin and shook slightly when the Guardian glared down at him with danger in his eyes. _

__ _ “I… I’ve been…” Khadgar’s voice grows weak. “R…. researching….?” _

__ _ “ _ I’m _ the Guardian.” Medivh said viciously. “Not you. Not yet.” _

__ _ “I just thought you might like some help-” _

__ _ “What makes you think that a  _ whelp  _ like you could  _ ever  _ help anyone?!” Medivh demanded, voice booming in the small room. “Powerless as you are…” _

_ Khadgar shrunk away and truly believed the Guardian might kill him. Medivh held the book before him as though he might strike the younger mage with it, but instead it burst into flames in his hand. Khadgar flinched and backed away, throwing his arms up to shield his face from the wild orange tongues. _

_ “Don’t presume you can aid me,  _ Mage-eater _.” the Guardian sneered, tossing the burning tome to the floor carelessly. “You have no idea of the forces I contend with. Leave the fel to me.” _

_ The name strikes a blade of ice into Khadgar’s heart.  _ Mage-eater _. That’s what they’d called him, in the rumors that flowed from Dalaran like poisoned cordial to his soul. He stood there, frozen, as the Guardian disappeared right before his eyes. _

Which brings him to where he is now, in the library, surrounded by sheaves of parchment marked with notes and scribbles and blacked out sections of pages. He frantically reproduces as much of the book as he remembers, almost in desperation. No matter what Medivh said, there is no way he can handle the overwhelming amount of threat from the portal  _ and  _ Gul’dan alone, and Khadgar must be as prepared as he can.

Because there’s nothing that fuels Khadgar more than defying his elders, after all.

That’s where Lothar finds him, hand and pen flying over the pages faster than he can blink. The commander makes a sarcastic noise of surprise, stepping around the pages that are scattered around the table and takes the seat across from Khadgar. He watches the mage work, almost mechanically, until his eyes are drooping.

An image plays behind Lothar’s eyelids, of his son on a cot in the healer’s tent. The injury on his head is much more severe than he thought and he bleeds out on the floor without ever knowing how important he is to his father. Lothar sits up with a shout, effectively scaring himself back to consciousness. Khadgar starts as well and sends half of his papers flying, sweeping them off the table with a jerk of his arm. 

“Huh?!” Khadgar gasps, searching the room wildly. His eyes fall on Lothar, who has a shocked expression on his face and staring into the far wall. “Lothar, what was that? You alright?”

It takes a few seconds for him to register the question being asked, but Lothar finally replies. “Yeah, yeah I’m fine. Just…” he trails off and rubs his eyes with the back of his hand. “Tired, is all. Keep doing, uh, whatever you’re doing, Bookworm.”

“It’s ‘Khadgar’.” he says, icily. “And I’m trying to recall what I can about this book I found-”

“Of course you found a book.”

“- that the Guardian burned.” Khadgar finishes, glaring. “He told me he didn’t need my help, but I don’t think he realized just how valuable the information in this could be.”

Lothar frowns. “He burned your book?” That’s odd, he thinks, but his friend must have had a reason to do so.

“Well, it wasn’t  _ my _ book, but I had it.” Khadgar shrugs, seeming completely unapologetic about the fact that he apparently stole somebody else’s book. Despite the fact that he could have the mage arrested for thievery, Lothar just doesn’t have the energy for it today.

So he waves Khadgar off with a noncommittal grunt and settles back into the chair. He notices a familiar book on the table, the same one about the dragon Aspects that he had not a day ago, and picks it up. He flips to the page he was on last and continues reading to take his mind off the thoughts plaguing him. He’s halfway through a paragraph about how dragons are Nature-based beasts and heal best when cared for using nature magic when Khadgar makes a noise of frustration and slams his pen down on the page he was working on.

“None of this makes any sense!” the mage exclaims and buries his face in his hands with a loud sigh. Lothar looks over the pages painstakingly written out with shapes and markings that he doesn’t understand, but the drawings are rather nice, he thinks.

“You’ve got a bit of an artist in you, huh?” he remarks, picking up one of the drawings. He recognizes the outline of a troll’s face and makes a grimace of distaste at it.

“And you’re reading the same book as yesterday.” Khadgar says. “What are you, a dragon enthusiast? Did you learn anything interesting from it, at least?”

“Yes, actually, and  _ yes _ . Did you know dragons heal better with druid magic than priest magic?” Lothar points at the maze-like diagram in the book. He doesn’t fully understand it, since he was never really one for studying the field of medicine, but he gets the gist of it.

“That’s true, I remember Professor Cyanigosa once got ice-lanced by a student with bad aim and the Kirin Tor had to call in some special druids from Stranglethorn to heal her. It was a big mess, honestly.”

“Professor Cyanigosa. Would that be one of the teachers you mentioned was a dragon?” Lothar asks, vaguely recalling the conversation, but his mind isn’t really focused on it. 

Khadgar nods in confirmation. “She was a bit mean, but she was a good teacher.”

Lothar hums in acknowledgement and continues reading. He bothers Khadgar a moment later when another question surfaces.

“Bookworm,” he calls, and Khadgar raises his head from the pile of papers he was reading. “If dragons are nature creatures, then what do they eat? Wouldn’t it be bad for them to eat animals, since they exist to right the balance of life and all that?”

Khadgar barks out a laugh before he can stop himself, and Lothar finds that he wouldn’t mind hearing more of the sound. “Most dragons eat animals just fine,” the mage replies. “The animals provide the dragons with nourishment and energy, and in return the dragons preserve the animals’ land and protect them from outside harm. Eating is a necessity, and so is life and death. The dragons understand that.”

“What’s this talk of dragons?” the library doors creak open and Taria strides in, followed by Garona. “My commander and mage are discussing creatures of legend, when a potential war is on the rise.” she teases, and Lothar makes a face at her.

“Hello your M- I… I mean, hello Taria.” Khadgar calls, waving at her from across the room and she makes a small wave back.

“Are we not allowed to relax, on our spare time?” Lothar says teasingly. “Besides, I’m the one reading about dragons. Khadgar, over here, is writing gibberish and drawing.”

“It’s not gibberish!” Khadgar says indignantly. “It’s very important. This all comes from a book that was talking about that great gate thing in the Black Morass. Or, well, I hope it is, since I can’t read any of it…”

Garona’s interest is piqued and she slides around the table to see what Khadgar is working on. She picks up a drawing, the one he’d made of the gate illustration, and grunts. “This is our arrival in this world, in the swamp.” she remarks, and all three humans stare at her. “This is us, coming out of the gate…. How did you know of this?”

“It was in a book.” Khadgar replies, as though that explains everything. Perhaps, to him, it does. “You’re holding it sideways, though, it goes like this-”

“It goes like  _ this _ .” Garona insists, nearly tearing the paper right in half to prove her point. Khadgar looks at her strangely then back at the paper, noticing something strange about the landscape. Before, the gate had towered over the darkened land, but with the change in perspective the same ground turns into a dark, hooded figure, beckoning.

“Light, it almost looks like… Like someone calling them from  _ this _ side…” Khadgar says, eyes widening in realization. “They were invited here!”

Khadgar scrambles to his feet and pulls out some more pages, shoving them into Garona’s hands. “Do any of these make sense to you? Anything that might look like a spell?” he asks, showing her the pages he transcribed.

“These are written in old Draenor language,” she shakes her head. “I recognize the shapes but cannot read them all. But this one, on your picture,” she points at the caption he’d copied earlier. “The letters, I can read them. This one says ALODI.”

“ALODI?” Lothar asks, leaning over the table to get a better view. He looks at the markings on the paper where Garona is pointing, but it doesn’t make any more sense to him now that he sees it. “Mean anything to you, Bookworm?”

Khadgar also shakes his head. “Not that I recall, but I’ll ask... well. I’ll figure it out.”

“Do you need help with that, Khadgar?” Taria asks. “I could ask Medivh-”

“No!” Khadgar exclaims, then composes himself. “I mean, don’t bother him with this. I have it covered.” 

Lothar searches the mage for any suspicious signs, and finds none. He shrugs,  _ mage things _ , he thinks, and then turns to his sister. “What business do you have here, Taria? Making fun of us for being in the library, when you come to the library as well? Coincidental timing, bringing Garona around just when the Bookworm needed help with his doodles.”

“I’m just giving Garona a tour of the castle.” the Queen laughs. “If she is to stay here for a while, she should know where everything is.”

“That’s fair,” Lothar nods. “Well, while you two are here, resolve this for me. Which is your favourite dragonflight? Mine is red.”

“Mine’s blue, but Lothar said it doesn’t count.” Khadgar pipes up.

Taria is certain when she gives her answer, the Green dragonflight, but Garona looks confused about the question. When asked if she understood, she asks in return: “What are dragons?”

“Dragons are big, scaled creatures with wings that breathe fire.” Lothar says. He flips open to a page with the dragon anatomy and turns the book toward the orc so she can see it. “They look like this, and there are five different colours, Red, Blue, Green, Bronze, and Black.”

Garona approaches carefully and runs her finger over the page. “Ka’rasak.” she whispers and her eyes flick briefly toward Khadgar. The mage, ever curious, looks interested in the word.

“What does that mean?” he asks. Garona turns her head and looks at him over her shoulder.

“In human language, it would be ‘black dragon’, I think.” she says. “That is the orc word for it. There are some in the mountains, in orc world, and they are very dangerous. I did not know there were other colours.”

Khadgar and Lothar share a look. ‘Black dragons are definitely not good’ they silently agree. 

“Ka’rasak feed off of the energy of the beasts they kill,” Garona continues. “A lot of times, they hunt for sport and feast on prey they don’t need. They take life, and sometimes magic, if there is any, from their kills.”

“For being creatures of nature, they sound no better than the fel.” Lothar snorts with derision.

Khadgar remains silent, and studies his drawing of the gate with great interest.

\-----

__ _ The first week had been alright, he’d survived on his own by begging and buying whatever food he could with the money he managed to scrounge up, but everything went south after that.  _

__ _ He couldn’t keep anything down. As soon as he’d swallowed it, it came right back up completely undigested. And yet, he found, he had no other symptoms of sickness. He didn’t cough, or sniffle, or have a fever, so he was at a loss as to what could be the trouble. _

__ _ It was when he smelled the arcane power of a mage nearby that he realized that something was very, very wrong with him. _

\-----

The air in the pass is stale and unmoving, yet electric with the smell of a brewing storm in the distance. The Stormwind forces press on determinedly, following their king.

“We’ll be alright,” Llane reassured them. “We have the Guardian looking over us.”

They were not convinced, though, because the Guardian is nowhere to be seen. Instead, heading the pack along with the King, are the orc woman and the runaway mage. They follow Lothar’s horse, the hooves of their steeds making loud  _ clack _ s on the unforgiving stone.

From the opposite end of the pass, a handful of large brown orcs advance toward them. The two groups meet in the middle, watching each other’s every move with a wary eye. The middle orc, which Khadgar recognizes as Durotan, moves forward. The King dismounts, to the soldiers’ protests, and approaches the chieftain. Garona slides off her horse as well and follows him to the center.

There is an intense discussion that Khadgar only half listens to, most of his attention split between watching the top of the canyon where Medivh should be, and trying to ignore the growing emptiness in his stomach. How long has it been since he last ate anything? 

Something about Gul’dan and catching him off-guard, attacking him from within the Horde forces, comes up and Khadgar strains to hear it. It’s a sound plan, of course, to catch the warlock when he’s at his weakest, but the risk of having to face so many angry orcs afterward is an unpleasant idea. 

There is a shout from the back, one of the orcs lets out a warning cry before he is overtaken by a furious green beast. Green-skinned orcs burst from the ground, hidden from view by the rocks, and descend on the two parties with an unspeakable rage. The Stormwind soldiers, as well as Durotan’s orcs, are caught completely by surprise and struggle to form a counterattack.

The roar boomsticks going off echo on the slate, clashing horribly with the sound of steel on steel and the yells from both men and orcs. Garona vaults over a green orc and plants a blade in it’s chest with a cry of fury. She turns just too slowly to catch sight of another orc charging her. She braces herself for the impact, but it never comes. Instead, a shock of orange slams into the enemy, tossing it aside and searing its flesh with an awful smell. A smell she knows, she realizes, from her home in the other world. A smell that, more often than not, came from the mountains.

“Are you alright?” Khadgar asks, breathing heavily. Garona nods, and he spurs his horse further to help with the battle. She can’t help not notice that he looks paler, more gaunt, than he did before, and she wonders if maybe she should have been the one asking if  _ he _ was alright.

The tides aren’t turning and the Stormwind soldiers are suffering greatly. Most of the are gathered near the King, fighting hard to keep him alive, but some are being cut off from the rest of the troops by the orcs pushing them further into the pass. 

“Where is the Guardian!?” someone shrieks, her leg caught by one of the beasts’ massive axes. She falls over and scrambles away, saved only by the bolt of arcane that Khadgar fires at her attacker. 

As though called, a loud  _ BOOM _ fills the air and a wall of lightning descends from the sky. Some orcs are caught in the middle when it falls and have their limbs and bodies cut clean in half by the magic. There is a collective sigh of relief from the soldiers, but they quickly begin panicking again when they realize that there are still good men alive on the other side of the barrier.

One of those good men being Callan.

There is a terrible noise as Lothar’s armor comes into contact with the wall of lightning, his struggle to reach through and grab the boy on the other side causing sparks to fly from the steel. The commander is thrown backward when the resistance becomes too much.

“Medivh!” he cries, but he is barely heard over the din of the fight. “Medivh, take it down!” Lothar thinks of all the opportunities he had to be a good father, or at least a decent one, to praise and encourage his son to be a better man. He thinks of the nightmare that shook him in the library, and he doesn’t think he’ll live if he feels that loss again.

He picks up an orcen shield and launches himself at the wall with a vengeance, grunting with the effort of pushing against it. Callan looks back at his father with a determined look and nods. He turns to his enemy, back to the wall, and yells a challenge. He fights bravely, so do the other soldiers, but it’s clear they’re overwhelmed. The well-placed swing of an axe takes Callan’s right arm and Lothar howls in rage, powerless.

Khadgar looks rapidly between the wall and the side of the cliff, where Garona is scaling upward to where the Guardian is. He really should help, especially if the wall is the only thing keeping the soldiers safe from the orcs, but…

His hands connect with the wall and he feels them beginning to burn. He ignores the pain and focuses on the magic itself - the mana, the ley energy - and  _ pulls _ . The energy from the wall warps toward him and bunches around his hands, the same way a blanket would if someone grabbed it tightly. It flows into him easily, like water filling an empty cup. It leaves him with a strange, round sensation in his mouth.

Lothar looks over at the mage, so small beside the towering barrier, and watches as the lightning closest to him begins to flicker and fade. Bright blue, almost white, pulls from the wall and into Khadgar’s hands. His eyes grow wide when he realizes that he can see clearly through to the other side.

Khadgar nearly shrieks in pain from the magic overloading his body but doesn’t pull away, a hole just big enough for two men to pass through forms under his hands and he struggles to keep himself standing, holding it open. A few soldiers duck through, seeing their chance, but some still don’t see the escape and continue to fight. An orc, though, notices the missing soldiers and limps toward Khadgar with fire in it’s eyes. 

Khadgar isn’t given a chance to defend himself when someone ducks past him from behind and the orc’s hammer meets a tempered steel blade. 

“Lothar!” Khadgar gasps, legs shaking from the effort of holding the hole open. The commander doesn’t reply, cutting the orc’s throat open and grabbing his son by the back of his armor. Hacking viciously at the orcs attempting to grab them he pulls the boy through to safety, followed by three more panicked soldiers, and nearly tackles Khadgar to the ground.

The moment he isn’t in range of the barrier, the hole collapses and fills with electricity once again. Khadgar remains on his back in a daze as the other soldiers scramble to their feet and the King calls for them to pull back.

There is a faint noise, of someone shouting his name, but he can’t focus on the voice. There’s a ringing in his ears, and his vision is spotted with white and black. He sees a small, sort-of green figure at the top of the canyon wall, waving both arms. “Garona?” he asks, blinking quickly to clear his eyes.

“I think there’s something wrong with the Guardian!” Llane shouts. “Mage, take one of my birds and fly him to Karazhan, you’ll never make it in time with the horses!” 

One of the soldiers produces a strange tube from the pouch on his horse’s saddle and begins swinging it over his head. The noise the tube makes is high pitched and hollow, hurting Khadgar’s ears. In the distance, a dark speck rapidly grows larger as it approaches. Khadgar slowly gets up, taking a few seconds to regain his balance, and stumbles toward the gryphons that drops from the sky, called by the tube’s sound. He ignores the beast’s annoyed protests as he climbs into it’s back and kicks it into motion.

Lothar watches him go, a hand on Callan’s back. Did Khadgar seem somehow… alight, skin sparking with white and blue? He shakes his head and tends to his son. It must have been the magic from the wall, he reasons. 

 

Khadgar lands on the stone near Garona and she rushes to him. “The human shaman, he collapsed as soon as I touched him. He is not well!” she explains, and Khadgar does indeed see Medivh on the ground behind her.

“O- okay, uh.” he founders for a coherent thought. “Get him on the gryphon, we need to bring him to Karazhan. There’s a font at the top, he can refill his mana stores there!”

Garona nods and hurries back to Medivh, picking him up easily and carrying him to the gryphon. She looks from the bird to the Guardian and back.

“He cannot hold himself up.” she says with certainty. “He will fall off.”

Khadgar curses, seeing sense in her words. “Alright, just… Hold him, then. Don’t let him fall!”

They both know Garona is more than strong enough to hold the man, and they also both know that she carries a very precious person. To trust her with such an important task is monumental, and they both realize the weight of it. 

Garona nods with a sense of renewed purpose and lifts both herself and the Guardian onto the back of the saddle with ease, and Khadgar spurs it into the sky.

The flight isn’t long, but the minutes spent in the air are minutes in which the Guardian grows weaker, and Khadgar begins to fret. He turns back every so often, watching Medivh with worry. It’s strange, he notes, how this man could have such a calm expression when Khadgar knows that he can change to a look that could shake someone to their core with fear. 

When the gryphon touches down on the top balcony of Karazhan Garona doesn’t hesitate to hit the ground running. At Moroes’ instruction she and Khadgar guide the unconscious Guardian into the font, the blue glow of the mana casting an eerie light on the man’s face. Khadgar gently hits Medivh, urging him to wave up.

“I told him he shouldn’t leave the tower,” Moroes says, shaking his head. Khadgar finally manages to get a sign of life from Medivh and hurriedly removes the man’s cloak so that more of his skin is exposed to the font’s mana store.

Medivh blinks awake with a noise of confusion, and the sight pierces Khadgar’s very soul with terror. In the Guardian’s bleary eyes, he sees the briefest flicker of green. 

Khadgar’s mouth runs dry and he cracks his lips open with great pain. “I… I need to go. We need the help of the Kirin Tor, immediately!” he gasps and stumbles away from the font. Garona looks at him in confusion but urges him on with a wave of her hand. 

He disappears up the stairs when Moroes returns with a blanket and a mug of some steaming liquid. He wraps the blanket around Medivh and hands the mug to Garona, who accepts it gratefully. If there’s one thing she’d learned during her stay, it’s that warm mugs mean comfort and reassurances, if nothing else.

\-----

_ Dragons are old beings, professor Cyanigosa told them. They are born only out of the purest of intentions and nature’s will. _

__ _ But that’s not entirely true, is it? Khadgar thought, remembering the black dragons and everything they’ve done. All the terrible acts committed by the black dragons, crimes against the other flights and the very balance of life itself.  _

__ _ If nature truly is so good, then why is it that such bad things exist in this world? _

\-----

Garona appears in the healer’s tent, which is… not where she expected to be, honestly. She had thought that she would find herself in Goldshire, since the Guardian had been sending her to Lothar, but as it turns out he wasn’t ready to drink himself dumb just yet.

He sits in the far corner, beside the prone form of his son. She approaches the two quietly, but Lothar notices her anyway. He beckons her closer, putting a finger in front of his lips to indicate that she should keep the noise level at a minimum.

“Is he alright?” she whispers, peering down at the young soldier on the cot. Lothar nods, then takes a shaky breath.

“I almost lost him today.” he says, dazed, as though he’s still not entirely sute it happened at all. “Behind the wall, Medivh’s barrier, he…”

Garona pats the top of Lothar’s head kindly. “But he is not dead,” she points out. “Just missing an arm. Could have been worse.”

They are silent for a long while, watching Callan breathe. His chest rises and falls, a hard reminder that he is alive at all. Garona takes in a quiet, sharp breath. “I am sorry.” she says, and cannot bring herself to look into the commander’s eyes.

Lothar nods, because he knows it could have been so much worse, and because he knows Garona is blaming herself for the ambush. “I… I blamed him for Cally’s death, you know?” he murmurs, and Garona brings her hand down to stroke the man’s cheek. He leans into her touch, needing the comfort right now. “I don’t blame you for what happened in the pass. You didn’t know that they would attack us like that.”

“I do not think the attack was of Durotan’s making.” she tells him, but he isn’t listening. His eyes are falling shut, the day finally catching up with him.

“It’s Khadgar,” Lothar says, and Garona is confused for a moment until he continues his train of thought. “He’s the reason why Callan, and those others, are alive. He stepped in and saved them, when Medivh did nothing.”

There’s that strange feeling in his chest again, but it feels good this time. Warm, and comforting. He recognizes it from a long time ago, but he can’t quite place what it is. He leans into Garona and wraps an arm around her, and she doesn’t protest.Their lips meet without fanfare, mindful of the sharp tusks between them. They share a tender moment, but all too soon it’s over. Lothar pulls back, looking more confused than he did before. The feeling in his chest is still present, but doesn’t flare up in the woman’s embrace as he expected it to.

“I… I’m sorry.” he says, and Garona nods. It’s not her, and she understands. She lets her heart break a bit as she takes a step away from him and bids him goodnight, but his eyes are already closed and he rests his head on the side of the cot.

 

Strong wings pump on either side of him as he flies as swiftly as he can toward the floating city. He dreads, deep in his heart, the consequences of returning to Dalaran, but this is bigger than him, or anything else in the world. This is the fate of all of Azeroth hanging in the balance, and damn it all if he’ll let the actions of the past stop him from saving it.

He lands in the city, running before his feet even touch the ground. He must hurry, before anybody else sees him. He heads to the great chamber where he knows the Council of Six are gathered.

His lungs are heaving when he reaches the top of the stairs, but he isn’t given a moment to catch his breath when the Archmages realize who he is.

“Khadgar!” one of them shouts, and he’s hard pressed to dodge a bolt of fire thrown at him. He feels more spells charging the air; he must hurry before they blast him right out of existence.

“Please, I come seeking your wisdom!” he begs, holding his hands out in front of himself in surrender.

“There is nothing for you, here.” Antonidas spits, and the rejection burns in Khadgar’s heart but he presses on.

“The Guardian is unwell!” he shouts, and the mages cease their casting.

“What?” murmurs and looks of confusion are passed around the room. There is outrage, and fear, shared amongst the Six, and even Antonidas seems to be struck dumb. The archmage gathers himself more quickly than the others, and the sneer is back on his face as though it never left.

“You lie.” he says, shaking his head and raising his hand for another spell, and the rest of the Six follow suit.

“It’s likely your fault, if he is,” another Archmage hisses. “You always were nothing but trouble, reading those books on magic that the Kirin Tor specifically banned!”

“Have- Have you heard of the Dark Portal?” he tries, and gets to dodge an ice lance for his troubles. Khadgar has no time left and he knows it. He offers one last attempt, because what else is there for him to lose?

“What is ALODI?” he demands, voice cracking shamefully, but it doesn’t matter to him anymore. Mercifully, Light be blessed, all Six Archmages stop their spells. They stare at him in complete silence, not even the sound of their breathing reaches his ears. He shudders.

“How does he know?” one of the mages asks. Antonidas strides forward and claps a hand on Khadgar’s shoulder, and the younger mage flinches away on instinct.

“Come with me, boy,” the Archmage says stiffly. “There is an answer to your question.”

The old mage leads him down, deeper than he thought the island even was, into a large chamber filled with cells. A prison? Khadgar wonders if, perhaps, his time has come to an end and he will be imprisoned here by furious mages for the rest of his life. 

Instead of locking him in a cell like he expects, Antonidas leads Khadgar further into the Hold and toward a hidden door at the very back. The hand on his shoulder does not loosen as he is led into the small room. 

Inside is a large, black, floating cube. The surface of it is clearly liquid, almost like a thick ink, yet it holds itself like a solid. At all four corners of the room stand four mages, unnaturally straight and chanting, trancelike. The faces of the cube ripple with runes and words in a language Khadgar does not ever recall seeing in his lifetime. 

“ALODI.” Antonidas says, offering no further explanation.

“This is it?”

“This is it. Nobody outside of the Council knows of it’s existence,” the Archmage leans in closely, beard brushing against Khadgar’s ear, sending a shiver down his spine. “And it will stay that way. For someone like  _ you _ to utter it’s name, and in the same breath as the Dark Portal cannot be a-”

The cube ripples violently, almost seeming to be taking deep breaths, and cracks open right in the center. A hole forms in the face closest to Khadgar, and three small steps mold into existence below it.

“... coincidence.” Antonidas finishes, seeming just as shocked as Khadgar. 

Khadgar swallows nervously. “Do I… go in?” he asks, still half expecting the mage to throw him into one of the cells he’d seen earlier.

“Perhaps you should.” Antonidas agrees, to his surprise. “But this does not mean that you are any more trusted than before, boy.”

So Khadgar takes a hesitant step forward, and Antonidas does not drop his hand until he is out of the Archmage’s reach. He almost looks back to the man, who he’d loved as a father once, but he knew he would find no reassurances in the other’s eyes.

He steps into the black void of the square called ALODI.

The darkness is warm and presses on him from all sides, almost suffocating him. Khadgar calls out, but his voice is swallowed by the creeping black. He’s about ready to give up when something rises out of the floor, a hooded, humanoid shape.

A familiar shape, he thinks, a mysterious presence…

“You!” he gasps, finding the weight of the darkness lessen around him. “From the library, in Karazhan.”

“Yes,” the figure laughs, a voice sounding almost feminine. They sober just as quickly. “Come, All Are In Danger. I Am Afraid The Guardian Has Betrayed Us.”

Khadgar scrambles over to their side and nods quickly. “Yes, the fel! I saw it in his eyes.” he says. ALODI shakes their head, disappointed.

“He Has Been Consumed By It,” they say. “He Must Be Stopped, Or This World Will Fall.”

Khadgar looks at them pleadingly. “But how could this have happened? He’s the Guardian!”

“It Is The Loneliness,” ALODI says, voice sounding like wind. “A Guardian Is Charged To Fight For This World Alone. His Heart Was True, And He Sought To Master All Kinds Of Magic In Order To Protect That Which He Loved Most.

He Came Across It, A Dark And Foreboding Magic, And In His Haste He Did Not Realize It’s Toll. It Overcame Him, Twisting His Soul, And Turned His Love Of Azeroth Into A Desire To Destroy It.”

ALODI turns to Khadgar, and he is nearly terrified into unconsciousness by it’s face. There are no eyes, only two concave spots where they should be, and their nose is flat and slitted. Their mouth, the only normal-looking part on their deathlike pallor, is curved into a frown as it speaks to him. “You Must Face Him, Khadgan.”

“But I-” he is caught off-guard by the certainty in their voice. The blood drains from his face when he realizes what they said. “I can’t face him, he’s the Guardian!”

“Only In Name,” they say, stepping back. Khadgar feels the void around him close into the space ALODI occupied. “The True Guardians Are All  The Ones Who Fight For The Good Of This World.”

Khadgar turns to them and gasps, catching sight of the lines of fel around their face. But they are old lines, scars really, of a wound long since healed. “You Know What To Do.” they tell him, and he does know.

Because Medivh had been alone when he faced the fel. Khadgar does not have the same vulnerability, because he has someone who can help him.

“Lothar,” he breathes, and ALODI nods. The commander can stand with him, and he would not face the evil alone.

“Trust In Your Friends, And In  _ Yourself _ .” the being begins to fade back into the dark. “And Remember, From Light Comes Darkness… And From Darkness, Light!”

\-----

__ _ There wasn’t much he could do as he felt the wind rushing by him. The seconds tick down and he feels his lungs unravel, the counterspell finally releasing him. His lips move rapidly, casting something between Slowfall and an ancient spell only used by those of his blood. _

__ _ The ground comes at him at an alarming rate, and his fall is only just slowed when he feels sharp pain explode on his back. _

\-----

How did Lothar get here, in a damp cell and begging a guard to let him go free? Ah yes, he’d accused the King of making shit plans and questioned the Guardian’s powers in front of a full war room. Not with the nicest of words, which he acknowledges he could have probably phrased better, but at least he got his two coppers in before Llane ordered to have him locked up. 

He doesn’t regret what he’d said, though. He knows there is merit in his word when he says that Medivh is unreliable and likely will not be there when they need him the most. If he was unable to save the lives of five soldiers, trapped in a fight to the death thanks to his supposed ‘barrier of protection’, then how could he be expected to save an entire army? How many more lives would Medivh sacrifice needlessly, Lothar can’t even begin to count.

He waves the tankard in his hand and calls out to the prison guard again, even though he knows the man won’t budge. Damn him, training his soldiers so well. He’s not sure if he should be proud or despaired.

Garona had come to him earlier, reporting that Llane finally decided to go to war with the Horde. The very same plan Lothar told him to use, he laughs at the irony. His own plan, and yet here he is in a cell while the others march on orders he should have been giving. 

He’d told her not to trust the Guardian, and she nodded. She told him of Khadgar’s panic and how he returned to the Kirin Tor, which surprised him. He knew Khadgar left Dalaran and likely wasn’t welcome back, so to return there and in such a hurry…

He throws the tankard against the wall and it collapses on itself with a metallic  _ klang! _  The guard at the door starts, and approaches the cage with a reproachful look. 

“Commander, please be calm.” he says with a frown. Lothar looks at him with an equal smile.

“I am calm, I’m perfectly calm.” he says, voice just this side of too sweet. “Please let me out, private Merrik, so I can aid the King.” 

Merrik, the guard, looks torn between letting his commander go free and the orders given to him by the King. In the end, it’s decided for him when he disappears in a cloud of white smoke.

No, not disappeared. In Merrik’s place is a very confused sheep. It bleats and scurries out of the way when someone else walks in. Khadgar winces at the sheep apologetically before picking up the keys that had fallen to the ground and unlocking the door to the cell.

“Where the hell have you been?!” Lothar demands, ungrateful but honest. Khadgar almost grins, but he’s much too nervous to do anything other than grimace. 

“The Kirin Tor. Quickly, we need to…” he takes a deep breath to steady himself and hands the man a full bag that clinks. “Here’s your armor, Commander.”

Lothar is confused but grateful as he pulls on his armor with practiced ease. He’d been lying, before, when he told Merrik that he was calm, but he’s definitely calmer now that he had been.  He watches as Khadgar takes a piece of charcoal from the unlit brazier nearby and begins to draw runes on the ground.

“I hope we’re not too late.” Lothar huffs, glaring at the bewildered sheep-guard. 

“We’re not going after them, if we want to save Azeroth.” Khadgar says, finishing the circle and wiping his hands on his pants. Lothar whirls on him in anger.

“My king needs me!” he growls.

“Azeroth needs you more.” Khadgar looks him right in the eye with a will of steel that Lothar doesn’t remember the young man having before. “To save your King, we need to stop Medivh.”

He holds his hand out and blue light trails from it to the floor in what Lothar recognizes as a teleportation spell. The mage stands and looks at the commander expectantly. The King and his army, three legions of good soldiers, wait for him in the Black Morass, which is where he  _ should _ be if he were to be a good commander. However, he knows what Llane would want him to do would order him to do.

With a curse, Lothar enters the circle. Khadgar’s eyes, glowing bright blue, stare back at him with a resolute calmness that he appreciates in this trying time.

“We’ve got a demon to kill.” Khadgar says, and they disappear in a blink of arcane magic.

 

The font is a sick greenish color, and Moroes lies beside it a withered husk. Khadgar looks at the once healthy-looking man in horror. Lothar approaches the dark figure on the balcony above them, hesitant.

Medivh has his arms raised and chants in a low tone, almost unrecognizable from his natural voice. When he turns to Lothar, he’s shocked at how changed his friend has become. There are short, dark horns protruding from his jaw like a mockery of a beard, and lines dance across his skin like cracks in stone.

“Medivh?” he asks carefully. The demonic Guardian tosses a hand out toward him and lifts him using a phantom hand of green magic. The hand grips tighter, and Lothar’s breastplate threatens to collapse.

Khadgar throws some sort of spell, but it’s reflected just as quickly and he scrambles to dodge it. Medivh lets go of Lothar, who’s gone limp in his ghastly hand’s grip. He grins widely, teeth unnaturally sharp.

“So the little whelpling decided to show up after all,” he croons, but the sinister undertone of his voice ruins the intended effect. “Too late and too weak, Mage-eater! But then again, I really didn’t expect much from you to begin with.” The demon laughs and turns back to his incantation carelessly.

Lothar crawls slowly toward Khadgar’s hiding place, behind the giant clay golem. He remembers asking Medivh about it barely even a week ago, and he can’t be more glad for the shelter it provides from the demon’s horrific gaze.

Khadgar is cowering behind one of the golem’s legs, throwing a look behind him every so often. “He’s starting the portal incantation!” he gasps. Lothar shudders at the sound of the otherworldly words being spoken, feeling the dark magic crawl across his skin. 

“What’s the plan?” he asks, voice barely above a whisper.

Khadgar breathes heavily, almost hyperventilating. “We need…. We need to shut him up before he finishes the chant.” he says and heaves himself to his feet. He steps around the leg of the golem and fires a spell toward the balcony, hitting the pillars and collapsing the structure, but Medivh is nowhere to be seen.

“Impressive,” Medivh’s voice echoes around the whole room, sarcastic. “Now, try shutting  _ him _ up.”

The golem, lifeless just moments before, blinks to life with bright green fire for eyes. It rolls its shoulders as though preparing for a tavern brawl, advancing on Lothar dangerously. The chant for the portal emits from the glowing crack in it’s head, a crude joke of a mouth.

“Do something!” Lothar shouts at Khadgar, who makes a helpless shrugging gesture back. “Fine, take care of Medivh then! I’ll handle this guy.” He scrambles backward, picking up a carving tool and throwing it at the golem’s head. The clay giant turns to him with a speed he didn’t expect and charges. It crashes it’s massive fists through the tile, sending Lothar to the floor below.

Khadgar, meanwhile, fires spell after spell toward Medivh’s form, who deflects them all and redirects them into the tainted font, making the caustic green magic bubble and froth. Medivh retaliates by sending fireballs and bolts of fel energy at Khadgar, who has some difficulty blocking them. The don’t return to their caster, though, and instead get caught in the whirlpool of fel gathering in the font.

Khadgar musters up as much magic as he can and lets it go, channelling it toward Medivh, but the Guardian is gone.

Below, Lothar hacks and slices at the damp clay with his sword uselessly, and the golem would just not fall. His eyes search for something, anything, that would silence the thing, when he falls on a strange tool. It’s a wire, held between two wooden handles, likely meant for shaving clay off the surface of sculptures.

Well, it will serve as a good gag for now. Lothar picks it up and scrambles up the golem using his hands and feet, digging into the clay for purchase, and straddling it’s head. He ropes the metal garrote around the golem’s head and pulls it into the thing’s mouth like a brindle. 

The golem swings wildly, but Lothar dodges at the last moment. The clay being smashes straight into the Guardian’s chamber, catching Medivh’s attention. The corrupted Guardian raises a hand and casts, but Lothar is faster and he jerks the wire harshly. The golem rears in kind, effectively blocking Medivh’s spell, but loses it’s balance and crashes backward. 

Lothar briefly considers the thought that he might have made some poor decisions when he finds himself hanging backward outside the tower, held by his feet embedded in the Golem’s clay shoulders, about eighty meters above the ground. 

He watches in abject horror as his wire cuts slowly but certainly through the golem’s head, and he frantically pushes himself further into the clay. The top of the golem’s head falls past him moments later, and he hangs on for dear life as it slowly lifts itself back into the tower. 

The commander quickly unfastens his boots and hurls himself to the floor, landing with a wince. The golem rears and slams into the walls, seemingly unaware that it’s passenger has left it. While it’s distracted, Lothar crawls over to where Khadgar lay on the ground beside a ruined marble column.

His heart almost stops for a moment, a terrible second in which Lothar believes the mage is dead, but the faint breathing gives him hope. He pushes the rubble off of the younger man and hits his cheek lightly.

“Come on, Khadgar, wake up!” he breathes, and Khadgar’s eyes slowly open. He coughs a bit as he sits up, rubbing the back of his head. His eyes find the disoriented golem behind Lothar and he smiles grimly.

“Good thinking, cutting off it’s head.” he says, and Lothar gives him a deadpan look. 

“That’s exactly what I meant to do.” he shrugs. “What do we do now?”

He watches as Khadgar thinks, and he can almost hear the gears turning in the mage’s head. Finally, after a torturously long moment, Khadgar speaks.

“He has to keep speaking the incantation himself…. I…  I have a plan.” he says, sounding reluctant. “Distract Medivh for me, alright?”

“Anything else, your Highness?” Lothar asks sarcastically, already getting up to follow Khadgar’s lead. The mage shakes his head. 

“Just try to distract him for as long as possible, and keep him silent!”

Lothar shakes his head but emerges from behind the crumbled pillar and faces his old friend head-on. He hears Khadgar beginning to cast and puts his faith in the mage as he walks slowly toward the demon.

“Medivh? If you’re still in there…” he says, but the figure doesn’t waver. He moves closer, almost in arm’s length. “Medivh, come back to us. Please!”

The Guardian moves lightning-fast and grabs Lothar by his throat, still chanting. He holds the commander over the fel coloured font, contempt in his blackened eyes. Lothar squirms uselessly, wondering why he’s alive at all by now.

“Medivh!” he pleads, but the demon throws him clear across the room. He lands hard on his back, armor ringing against the floor. He scrambles up, chest heaving. “Come on, then! Come and get me, since you’re so keen on killing good people!”

He knows that Medivh had been terribly offended when he’d said so earlier, in the war room, and he’s distantly glad that the same argument is getting a rise out of the demon. The Guardian takes a step forward, into the font. 

“That’s all life is to you, isn’t it? Disposable? Just fuel, right?” he demands, and watches with growing fear as the fel warps his friend further beyond recognition. The demon grows, more horns sprouting from him. “Remember Llane! Medivh! Llane always believed in you. Don’t kill your king, your friend!”

The demon falls silent, only for a few second, and Lothar realizes that he can’t hear Khadgar either. 

A blood chilling shriek fills the tower.

\-----

__ _ Everyone in Dalaran knew the old story, the one of the blue dragon who had been horribly assaulted and killed by the Black dragonflight. The only remnant of her was her clutch of eggs, mostly broken and some still, but one lingered. It was taken in by the Kirin Tor and incubated for a century before it hatched. _

__ _ It was an awful little thing, corrupted by the evil dragonflight’s magic. It was barely the size of a grown man’s fist, and pitifully weak. All the mages expected it to die within the next few days. _

__ _ And yet it grew. It lived on for decades, feeding on small animals and drinking mana potions given to it by a surprisingly tender Cyanigosa. Every so often, she would feed it raw arcane energy, to encourage the hatchling’s Blue nature. It was eventually weaned off of the mana in favor of feeding it human food. _

__ _ Many were wary of it, claiming that any influence of the Black dragonflight would bring nothing but bad fortune and darkness, but Antonidas reprimanded them.  _

__ _ He will grow big and strong, the Archmage said. He may be small, but he is powerful at heart. He will be a great mage, someday. _

__ _ And he did grow, under the care of the Archmage and Cyanigosa’s tutelage. He learned all that they had to offer him, and then some. But his darker nature could not be ignored, and this came to light very quickly when the professors found him standing over the bloodied bodies of two of his fellow classmates, their arcane energy being sucked into his gore-stained maw. _

\-----

Lothar watches as a great, black beast rounds the pillar, licking it’s scythe-like teeth. Its scales glint in the light, reflecting green from the pool. It clutches a limbless golem in it’s front claws and heaves it toward the Guardian.

Medivh sidesteps the projectile just barely, stumbling as it grazes him. He falls into the font with a shout, finally ceasing his chant. The creature finally leaves the shadow of the room, revealing itself in all its terrifying beauty. 

It’s easily the size of a large draft horse and a half, and not fully black as Lothar first thought, but rather a deep navy blue fading to a purple on it’s stomach and legs. The membrane of it’s head fins and wings are bright purple, turning electric blue toward the edges, and it’s eyes are alight with white and blue. A handful of long, wickedly curved horns twist over it’s head and shoulders, casting an evil-looking shadow behind it.

The dragon snarls and advances on Medivh, pouncing on him like a cat and sending green splashing out of the font. Lothar leaps backward, back hitting the wall. The demon, grown nearly twice Medivh’s original size, is more than a match for the beast. They struggle for dominance in the font, the dragon sending chunks of stone flying with every flick of its long tail, as they fire green and blue bolts back and forth. The dragon manages to catch the demon’s arms with his front claws and screeches into the demon’s face.

It swings its head around and locks it’s eyes on Lothar, who pales in fear. It’s jaws drop open and he closes his eyes, but no flames come. He tentatively looks out and is surprised to see himself surrounded by a familiar blue dome. 

The dragon is nose to nose with the demon and has it’s jaws parted. It takes a deep breath, and Lothar sees tendrils of green flow from Medivh’s mouth to the dragons’. Slowly, at a near glacial pace, Medivh’s body begins to shrink. 

The commander watches in amazement as his old friend becomes himself, shedding the unsightly horns and once again resembling a human being. The dragon keeps pulling, inhaling much more than Lothar thinks would be possible for its lungs to take, stopping only when the mist coming from Medivh’s mouth turns blue instead of green.

The dragon snaps it’s teeth shut, making a hollow sound that causes Lothar to grimace, lifting itself off of the Guardian and moving out of the font. The shield around Lothar drops, and he races to Medivh’s side. Though weak, he feels the steady pulse in the man’s chest, and he nearly weeps in relief. 

His joy is short-lived, because the dragon bellows in pain and Lothar scrambles to avoid it’s swinging tail. He pulls Medivh away from it, hiding behind the empty font’s low walls. Across the room the dragon writhes on the ground, claws tearing up the tiles and eyes rapidly cycling between blue, purple, and green.

“Khadgan,” Medivh gasps, struggling into a sitting position. Lothar is beside him in an instant, helping the Guardian up.

“Khadgar’s not here, I don't know where he is, he said he had a  _ plan _ -”

“The dragon, Lothar!” Medivh says, shaking him frantically. “The dragon is Khadgan! Quickly, before he becomes corrupted!”

Medivh gets up with a strength Lothar didn’t think he had, stumbling toward the dragon curled up in obvious agony. He kneels beside it’s head and murmurs encouraging words to it, and Lothar is truly convinced that the man has gone mad.That is, until he approaches as well and finds a familiar strike of brown in the beast’s large, terrified eyes. 

“Fight it, Khadgan.” Medivh urges. “You’re better than this, you can overcome the fel. Don’t let it taint you the same way it did to me!”

The shifting eyes find Medivh’s face and the dragon lets out a pitiful whine. A green film covers it’s sclera like an infection. It’s breaths come in quick pants, and it’s limbs spasm. Lothar knees beside it and holds it’s legs down, preventing it from hurting Medivh or himself.

“What’s happening to him?” he asks, and Medivh shakes his head.

“He’s not a pure dragon, he’s already been corrupted from the start.” the Guardian tells him. “He’s a halfbreed that feeds on magic power, I think. His body is trying to digest the fel while the fel, in return, is trying to corrupt him and absorb his life force.”

That doesn’t sound like good new to Lothar, and he joins Medivh in encouraging the dragon. “Khadgar, come on, you’re stronger than it.” he hisses. “I know you are, you’re not a bad person. You might not be a pure dragon, or whatever that means, but you’re still good! You’re a good man!”

The dragon locks his eyes on the commander and he draws in a wheezy breath. Lothar feels his heart squeeze in his chest and he wants nothing more than to make Khadgar’s pain go away. The dragon jerks back suddenly, knocking Medivh over and pushing Lothar away with his paw. He backs away from them, chest fluttering with each gasp. The colours cycle in his eyes quicker, now, and he opens his mouth to cast another shield around Lothar and Medivh. 

They watch with bated breath as the dragon’s eyes flash from brown to blue to purple to green to, finally, a luminescent gold. He throws his head back and lets out an eerily human-sounding scream and a shockwave of green leaves him, knocking both men flat and exploding from the tower with a dull _ boom _ .

 

When Lothar can bring himself to lift his head, the tower is completely silent. Scared, he gets up in a panic and looks around. Medivh is lying nearby, still breathing thank the Light, and he moves over to his friend’s side to turn him onto his back. The Guardian’s eyes open weakly, and he breathes heavily.

“Is he alright?” Medivh asks, and Lothar remembers who it was he was worried about in the first place. He looks over and finds the dark blue dragon behind him, on his side and breathing shallowly.

The two make it over to Khadgar’s side and urge him to open his eyes. They all sigh in relief when they find no flickering colours, no  _ green _ , and collapse in a heap on the dragon’s stomach, which Khadgar noisily protests.

“Khadgan?” Lothar asks, looking to Medivh. The mage nods and chuckles out loud.

“His dragon name,” he explains. “Not too far off from the name he uses as a human, is it?”

They take this time to catch their breath, watching the sun travel slowly in the sky. What a mess the tower is in, they realize. Destroying things and getting into trouble? Sounds like something that Lothar and Medivh would have gotten into as youths, they both think, and they share some laughter. A piercing screech echoes in the pass and Lothar gets up in in a rush.

“The King!” he exclaims and races to the gryphon that awaits him. He bends down to pick up his sword and, before leaving, he turns to the dragon still on the floor with a tired smile.

“I’m proud of you, kid.” he says, and Khadgar makes a loud huff, blowing dust in his direction.

Medivh points at the gryphon, urging his friend on. Lothar takes the hint and races to the edge, trusting his bird as he launches himself off the platform and feeling her strong back under him.

Medivh also gets up after some time, dusting himself off shakily but determined. He begins chanting something familiar, but one of the words is distinctly different, Khadgar realizes. He’s reopening the portal, but redirecting it to Stormwind instead of the orc world. 

Khadgar gets up, shaking off his wings, and looks expectantly at the Guardian. After only a brief hesitation, Medivh climbs onto the dragon’s back and they take to the sky.

\-----

__ _ Khadgar remembers looking up at the sky at night and watching the stars glint, turning softly in their celestial sockets. He felt a presence sit beside him and he sighed. _

__ _ My mother is up there, he told them. She’s watching over me, right? Am I a son she would be proud of? _

__ _ Cyanigosa put one of her hands on his back and rubbed softly. You will be, she told him. One day, you will be. _

\-----

The battle is raging below him, and Lothar is almost terrified for a second that he’s too late, but he sees Llane in the middle of a cluster of Stormwind soldiers near the base of the portal. The portal, which he expected to be done with, is still shimmering with magic and his heart drops. Did he and Khadgar fail?

But he recognizes the image behind the rippling blue. Stormwind! The Guardian came through, despite Lothar’s doubts, and handfuls of soldiers at a time are pushed through the curtain of magic and into the safety of the city.

His gryphon lets out an ear-shattering shriek and descends on the orcs, tearing into them with her talons. Lothar jumps from her back and throws himself into the fray, pushing his way through to the King. Llane seems surprised to see him, and so does Garona behind him. She has something in her hand, a dagger, poised over Llanes throat. Lothar fears the worst and throws himself at her.

“Anduin, wait!” Llane yells, catching his friend before he can tear Garona’s limbs from their sockets. “She’s fine, I told her to do it.”

“You told her to kill you?!” Lothar demands, incredulous. 

“Yes! Well, the battle wasn’t going very well and I thought-”

“Hold that thought, then, damn you!” the commander sighs angrily, rubbing his eyes. “Alright, men, hold on just a little longer. The Guardian is coming!”

The battlefield goes still when a thundering roar fills the Black Morass. Bolts of bright and dark blue strike down from the sky, blasting orcs and their tents without mercy. Khadgar, wings making a drumlike noise as he flies, passes over the warring armies with another bestial cry. He circles downward and then dives down, across the orcs’ forces. He opens his mouth and a blinding stream of blue and purple flames erupts from him, cutting right through the Horde.

Medivh is on his back, maintaining the portal and sending spell after spell into the crowd of orcs who are quickly realizing that they’re at a disadvantage. Khadgar flies low, near the catapults, and completely devastates them with his breath. He rises up higher and casts, the spells emitting from his surprisingly deft claws. 

There is a large gap between the orcs and the Stormwind soldiers now, Lothar realizes, and orders the remaining troops to cross the portal. He grabs Llane before the King can leave, and looks into his friend’s eye.

“You will explain later,” he says, leaving no room for discussion. Llane seems amused but equally curious to hear what Lothar has to say about the dragon. He disappears into the portal as soon as Lothar lets go.

Khadgar lands beside the commander and Medivh slips to the ground, and stops casting. The portal sputters and finally closes. The Guardian, relieved of his burden, turns to Lothar. There are no more soldiers, and the orcs are too scared to approach the dragon. Khadgar lets out blasts of his blue fire, keeping the orcs at bay. They hesitate to attack him, finding it impossible to even come close to him without suffering arcane burns. 

“Are you ready to leave, my friend?” Medivh asks, and Lothar nods. He whistles, a sharp sound that echoes over the cries of the orcs, and the gryphon stops her fighting and returns to his side. She eyes Khadgar warily, making a warning noise in her throat, but Lothar shushes her. He mounts up and nods to the Guardian, kicking his mount into the air. 

Behind him, Medivh begins to cast another spell as he climbs back onto Khadgar, and the dragon takes off just in time to avoid the falling stones as the portal begins to collapse. There is a cry of outrage from the orcs, and a distinct flash of green shoots toward the dragon, but Medivh blocks the spell and it dissipates into the wind. On the ground, Gul’dan glares up at them with hatred.

Safe in the air, Khadgar lazily flies toward Stormwind. Lothar, on his gryphon, hovers a short way away. 

“Took you long enough, bookworm.” Lothar says, and the dragon makes a strange barking noise that he decides must be laughter. “Come on, let’s go home, then.”

\-----

__ _ Khadgar remembers traveling in the darkness, surrounded by trees that blocked out the sky. No light reached him, and he relied on his senses alone to guide him. _

__ _ When he came to a road, he smelled it. Something evil, and corrupted. He followed the scent to the gates of some city. Stormwind, he remembers reading on a weathered bronze plaque, green with oxidation. He looked up, past the crenelations of the towers, to the sky. Above him, finally, he saw the stars winking down at him. _

__ _ No matter how hopeless he felt the stars were always there, their light cutting through the darkness no matter how small they seemed. _

__ _ He creeped past the gate and followed the stench of corruption. _

\-----

\----

\---

\--

EPILOGUE

\--

\---

\----

\-----

All of Stormwind is silent as the citizens wait for news from the King. He sit in the throne room, glaring down at the three individuals before him: his angry best friend, his estranged Guardian, and… a dragon. 

“I hope there is a reasonable explanation for this.” Llane sighs and puts his head in his hands. “Anduin, you first please.”

“Can I just start by saying that I’m sorry for saying those mean things to Medivh, earlier?” Lothar asks, and the Guardian utters a quiet ‘apology accepted’. “This honestly has been one of the strangest days in my entire life, and I’m not sure I have my story straight to begin with. 

Alright, well, um. Khadgar broke me out of your cell and took me to Karazhan to fight the... demon that was possessing Medivh, and we managed to stop him from fully opening the portal. And then he turned into a dragon to pull the fel straight out of Medivh’s body and expelled it, removing its influence entirely…?”

“That’s right,” Medivh confirms. “No more fel in me. I, and all of Azeroth, owe him my life.”

Llane makes a tired gesture toward the sheepish dragon sitting between the two, his head ducked and looking at the King with what he could only describe as ‘puppy eyes’. “And what are we to do with…” he trails off, unsure of how to proceed with this.

“He will change back when he can muster the energy to,” Medivh says, and the King nods. “In the meantime, I would request the finest alchemists to make as many mana potions as they can, because we’ve got a hungry dragon to feed.”

The King finally dismisses them and Medivh leads Khadgar to the library, the only room currently big enough to house a dragon. Lothar finds his son still in the healer’s tent, a bandage around the stump of an arm. The boy looks much healthier than the last time his father saw him, smiling and chatting easily with Garona. 

“Glad to see you’re awake,” Lothar says to him, and Callan beams up at him.

“I’m glad, too! I thought for sure I was a goner.” Lothar winces at that. “Thanks for saving me back there, dad.”

Lothar awkwardly puts a hand on his son’s head and ruffles his hair. “You fought well, Callan.” he says. “I’m proud of you.”

Callan’s eyes go wide, comically so, and he feels his face begin to hurt with how much he’s smiling. He doesn’t say anything in return, but he pats the hand on his head and blushes at the praise.

“Maybe you’ll finally take up baking like I told you to,” Lothar teases and Callan hits him with a pillow.

“Lothar, I-” Garona begins, but the man shakes his head.

“Llane told me what happened, it’s fine.” he says. “Though I don’t agree with his methods, I understand why he asked that of you. Next time, just hit him over the head until he sees sense, alright?”

She seems stunned that the commander would forgive her so easily, but she takes whatever acceptance she can get and nods to him. 

 

The doors to the library are propped open with chairs when Lothar finally decides to visit the mages. It’s past nightfall and most of the city has gone to bed, only the guards and the taverns are active in the dark.

“I thought you said he would change back when he had the energy to,” Lothar remarks upon seeing Khadgar and Medivh, both human, surrounded by open books. Khadgar looks up at him, pale and tired, and waves.

“Commander, it’s good to see you.” he says. “The King gave me enough mana potions to give me the strength to change back, and Medivh and I were just discussing how my dragon form might work. The bodily functions, digestion, appetite…. Those kinds of things.”

“How come?” Lothar asks and pulls up a chair opposite of them. 

“The Kirin Tor knows where he is, now,” Medivh states. “You’ve heard the rumors, and what I…. what the demon called him, yes?”

Lothar nods and licks his lips. “Mage-eater, right?” Khadgar winces and looks down in shame. “That’s the rumor of… the two mages that were killed and eaten. I thought they meant a demon attack, or a wild animal of some kind.”

“That was Khadgar.” Medivh says, shaking his head. “He told me the Archmages starved him of mana and arcane energy, and I believe that the deprivation caused him to lose control of his hunger.”

“But the other Blue whelps are weaned off of arcane after two years!” Khadgar protests. “I shouldn’t even be  _ needing _ more arcane, since my body should be producing it naturally.”

“You’re not entirely a blue dragon, though.” Medivh points out. “You were corrupted in your egg by the Black dragonflight and, whether you like it or not, you do have some of their influence.”

“I still don’t see how that should affect me at all. I always preferred arcane magic over fire magic, and I never showed any dark tendencies other than...”

“I understand, but your Black side doesn’t manifest itself as murderous or dangerous; just hungry. Take that small blessing as it is, because you could have been dealt a much worse hand.” Medivh stands up and gathers some scrolls in his hands. “I will contact the Kirin Tor and attempt to have you pardoned for your actions. In the meantime, try not to get into too much trouble…”

Strangely, the Guardian’s eyes trail to Lothar when he says this, and he elbows the commander on his way out. Lothar watches him leave, confusion passing over his face.  _ What to make of that? _ he thinks. 

“So what brings you here, Lothar?” Khadgar asks, resting his arms on the table and his head in his arms. “Surely you have better things to do.”

“Checking up on you, actually.” Lothar says, grinning. “What’s a better thing for a dragon enthusiast to do than to ask a real live dragon about dragon things?”

“Say ‘dragon’ one more time, I swear.”

“Tell me something interesting about yourself and I’ll stop saying ‘dragons’.”

“You’re a real journey to deal with, you know that?” Khadgar sighs in exasperation. “Fine, what’s interesting by your standards?”

Lothar thinks about it for a minute, making a show of hemming and hawing over a remarkably trivial question, and finally ends with “How did you do it, in the pass? With the barrier, I mean?”

“The lightning wall?” Khadgar asks, blinking. “That was easy, if only a  bit painful. I had to pull the energy into myself to tear a hole through it…”

Lothar tunes the rest of his explanation out, watching the mage gesticulate wildly as he goes on about how magic works and how he used it. Despite his obvious exhaustion he seems much more lively than the Khadgar he remembers having a late-night heart to heart with, and Lothar’s heart pounds in his ribs.

The crushing feeling is back, but this time he recognizes it for what it is. He won’t act on it yet, he decides, but maybe sometime soon, when the aftermath of the war and the fel dies down and life returns to as normal as it could be, given the circumstances. 

“Thank you.” Lothar says, interrupting Khadgar.

“For what?” Khadgar ceases his tirade, smiling, a bit perplexed. 

Lothar shrugs. “For everything. For saving my son, and the others.”

“It’s alright, anyone would have done it if they could.” Khadgar says, ducking his head in embarrassment. “No need to thank me, and all that…”

“But  _ you _ did it, and I’m thanking you.” Lothar says with a finality in his voice. “You worked the hardest out of all of us, I think, and I don’t say that lightly. You deserve some thanks, at the very least.”

“But I don’t.” Khadgar shakes his head, not looking up to meet Lothar’s eyes.

“What?”

“Deserve it.”

Lothar’s brow furrows and he crosses his arms, staring at the mage until he’s squirming uncomfortably under the scrutiny. “Is this about what happened in Dalaran?” Lothar asks, and when Khadgar’s form crumples in on itself in defeat he knows he hit the nail right on its head.

“I killed people.” Khadgar says, his voice lost in the vastness of the library. 

“So did I, bookworm.” Lothar replies. “I’m in the army, killing people is my job.”

“Two innocent people lost their lives because I couldn’t control myself!” Khadgar bursts, standing abruptly and causing his chair to clatter to the floor noisily. “I’m not some soldier who took lives because of orders, Lothar. I’m a murderer.”

“Eating is a necessity.” Lothar counters. “Isn’t that what you said to me, about dragons eating things despite it being their role to protect them?”

“And weren’t you the one who said that dragons eating the lives and magic of others were no better than the fel?” Khadgar bites, and tears well in his eyes. “I’m… I’m just like the fel, right? Corrupted, and feeding on life…”

Lothar jumps out of his chair and nearly vaults over the table to pull Khadgar into a tight hug. He rubs circles into the mage’s back, shushing him quietly and rocking him back and forth.

“That’s not what I meant when I said that, bookworm.” he says quietly, resting his chin on top of Khadgar’s head. “Garona was talking about dragons who kill and take more than they needed. Those dragons are gluttons, and you’re nothing like them, do you understand? You were  _ starved _ , and you said so yourself. You acted out of desperation, it’s not your fault the Kirin Tor didn’t know how to care for you better.”

“You don’t know that!” Khadgar cries, his voice muffled by Lothar’s shirt. His arms reach up of their own volition and wrap around Lothar’s chest, his hands grabbing onto the back of the man’s shirt. Lothar feels wetness staining the front of his shirt, but doesn’t comment on it. “Maybe the Kirin Tor did everything right and I’m the broken one!”

Lothar nods, his beard catching on Khadgar’s hair and messing it up. “You’re right, I don’t know.” He agrees. “But that’s what Medivh said, and I trust him. He knows what he’s talking about.”

The pair remain silent for a very long time, Lothar holding Khadgar while he vents his emotions into the taller man’s shoulder. They eventually move back to the chairs, sitting side by side this time, and they lean on each other in silence until the very first rays of sunlight begin peeking over the horizon.

Khadgar draws in a shaky breath, exhaling a small cloud of mist. Neither of them knows when the air got so cold, but the frost creeping up the window indicates it must have been a while now. 

“Even….” Khadgar’s voice is rough from crying and he clears his throat before continuing. “Even if you and Medivh are right, about me needing to eat mana and arcane, the Kirin Tor will likely put me on trial for the deaths of those two students anyway.”

“You’ll survive.” Lothar says with a yawn. “If Medivh is there vouching for you and arguing on your behalf, you can expect the Kirin Tor to hand you your freedom on a silver platter. They might offer you the platter, too, if he can make them.”

Khadgar laughs, a watery sound, but it’s good to see the smile pulling at his lips. Lothar pats his shoulder firmly and gets up, stretching his sore arms and legs. His side, the one Khadgar had been leaning on, feels colder than the other, but he ignores it.

“We should probably get some sleep,” he reasons, and yawns again. “Come on, Bookworm, I’ll walk you to your room.”

“Well, you should get some sleep. You look like you might inhale half of the library with that big mouth of yours.” Khadgar teases but gets up and stretches anyway. If his side is cold as well, he doesn’t show it. 

They walk down the hallways as quietly as they can, their boots sounding like boomstick shots in the quiet of the dawn. They eventually reach Khadgar’s room with their eyes half closed and breaths deepening.

“Alright, this is it.” Khadgar says. “Thank you, Lothar.”

“No problem, Khadgar.” Lothar leans down a bit and plants a gentle kiss on the mage’s forehead. “I’m proud of you. Get some rest, alright? I’ll see you in the morning.”

Khadgar’s hand flies up to rub at the spot where Lothar kissed, his face turning an interesting shade of red. “I… you- ? Um, good- goodnight, Lothar.” he flounders, opening the door to his room and stepping inside. He closes the door quickly, and the sound reverberates through the stone.

Lothar grins at the door, putting his hands in the pockets of his trousers. He meanders down the halls and up the stairs toward his own room in the Keep, which he barely uses, and honestly he should use it more because it’s quite nice and has a very comfortable bed. He passes a window and stops in front of it to watch the orange glow.

Night falls, he thinks, and darkness blankets the world with uncertainty and fear, but the sun always rises in the morning.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> that epilogue really ran away from me man....
> 
> anyway, I hope you enjoyed this! Thank you for following me on this wild ride ( 0v0)b if you see any spelling mistakes or continuity errors, please tell me!  
> [edit] i just realized the very first paragraph had an error and i just. we're off to a great start lmao
> 
> and if you're curious, Khadgar is essentially a Twilight dragon but before Sinestra ever started her experiments on them, because I figure his corruption would act the same as her method of turning the eggs ?? i'm not a lore expert by any stretch of the imagination, so just use your imagination or something i guess \\( ;v; )/ sorry. I might put a drawing of my version of dragon!Khadgar, probably on my blog or something i guess, if you ever want to see it 
> 
> p.s. some of the conversations, especially about the dragons, are inspired by real info I got off of the wow wikis and one particularly amusing forum question i ran into while ""researching"" hhaha i just really like dragons (._. ) i may need an intervention


	2. this is just a drawing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> here's a drawing of what I pictured Khadgan would look like ?? feel free to interpret him differently though \\( 'v' )/


End file.
